


All Your Wonders

by placentalmammal



Category: Fallout (Video Games), Fallout 4
Genre: Alcohol, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Canon-Typical Violence, Explicit Sexual Content, F/F, Found Family, Friends to Lovers, Happy Ending, Illustrated, Slow Burn, Trans Character, Trans Female Character, Vaginal Sex
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-10
Updated: 2016-07-10
Packaged: 2018-07-22 19:07:46
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 3
Words: 34,653
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7450663
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/placentalmammal/pseuds/placentalmammal
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The Railroad was supposed to be a stepping stone on her way to the Institute, but Sole Survivor Edith wasn’t counting on Glory, the “ass-kicking poster child of a liberated synth.” She’s immediately smitten, but it’ll take a lot more than a few good deeds to convince Glory of her sincerity. See authors' note for more detailed content warning.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> The beautiful, perfect, lovely illustration in ch. 2 is courtesy of my amazing collaborator, [fortzancudo](fortzancudo.tumblr.com), you can view more of their work [here](http://fortzancudo.tumblr.com/tagged/milkdraws)!
> 
> As always, thank you to my beta-reader/cheerleader Choco ([Tumblr](http://chocochipbiscuit.tumblr.com/)|[AO3](https://archiveofourown.org/users/chocochipbiscuit)), who really helped me get this monster fic into a readable form!

The trail began at Boston Common and ended at Old North Church. Two miles through supermutant territory, the August sun hot and merciless overhead. Edith had expended two hundred caps’ worth of ammunition along the way, her pack growing lighter as she made her way through the ruins of the North End, shotgun cradled in her hands like an extension of her arm. Exhausted, irritated, and aching, she craned her neck to look up at the steeple raised like a middle finger against the unrelenting blue sky.

She hesitated for a moment, hand on the Courser chip in her pocket. The thumb-sized device was her key to the Institute, and its invaluable data was shrouded in dense layers of cyber-security. The chip would not yield its secrets easily. Edith was a simple woman, her tastes and skillset tended toward gasoline and shotgun shells. Cracking the chip was entirely beyond her abilities.

After she’d killed the Courser, Z2-47, she had gone first to the Brotherhood of Steel. In the past, she had done a few errands for them, had been a welcome presence in their outpost in Cambridge. She’d gone directly from Greentech Genetics to the Cambridge Police Station to ask for help.

It hadn’t gone well. The Paladin and Scribes had made noises about confiscated the chip for their own ends, and Edith had objected. The argument stopped just short of a firefight, but _just_ short of a firefight. Edith fled, tracking east to the Castle, where she appealed to the Minutemen for aid. They were willing but unable, and returned the chip to her after a cursory examination of its firewalls.

“It’s beyond me,” said the Minutemen technician, shrugging. “Your best bet would be the Railroad, provided you can find ‘em.”

Resigned, Edith had followed the Freedom Trail and ended up at Old North Church, winded and with blood oozing from a shallow cut on her thigh. She hesitated for a moment, and approached the building cautiously. It was red brick and white plaster, the colors stark and crisp despite the church’s age. Edith mounted the cracked stairs and paused to read the historical marker affixed to the wall.

_Built in 1723, the Old North Church is the oldest standing church in Boston. Its 191 foot tall steeple also makes it the tallest church in Boston._

There was a lantern above the marker, a crude silhouette marked out in white chalk. Edith snorted and rolled her shoulders. Prepared for the worst, she swung her shotgun around, leveled it chest height, and kicked the door open. The dry wood splintered and the door burst inward, slamming against the interior wall. Edith crossed the threshold, head on a swivel, a scowl set like concrete.

The sanctuary was empty: the organ had sunk into the floor and parts of the ceiling had collapsed. Although the wood floors were warped and split, they conspicuously clean and free of plaster dust and grime. Someone had been there recently.

The hairs on the back of Edith’s neck stood up. Hefting her shotgun, she whirled around and found herself alone in the deserted church.

Shivering, she turned again, and her eyes fell on the collapsed choir loft. There was another lantern chalked on the dark wood, and Edith rolled her eyes. 

“Real fucking subtle,” she said, out loud to the empty ruin. “Very sneaky. Cloak and dagger.” 

Edith advanced through the ruin, down a twisting staircase and into a cave-like catacomb The walls were ancient fieldstone, mortared with thick grey paste, graves set into the walls at intervals. Edith didn’t linger, rushing forward until she found a dial set into the wall. A puzzle and a passcode. She twisted the dial to spell RAILROAD, and the hidden door swung inwards.

The room beyond was cave-like, dark and still. Two steps over the threshold, and a pair of floodlights clicked on, searing their image into Edith’s retina. She flung an arm up to shade her eyes, squinting against the bright light. 

Three people stood silhouetted in front of the floodlights. Two women and a man, their features vague and hazy as Edith’s pupils slowly contracted, adjusting to the bright light. The figures swam into focus, each was armed and armored, weapons trained on Edith, faces fixed in identical scowls.

She swallowed and set her shotgun on the ground, wincing as the motion jarred her injured leg, reopening her wound and sent a fresh wave of blood trickling down her thigh. Panting, Edith raised her hands over her head. “Hey there,” she said, unsticking the words from her throat. “Railroad?”

One of the women -- white, her ash-brown hair cut in a neat bob -- shook her head. “We’re going to be asking the questions, here.” Her voice was crisp and unaccented, oozing authority. She was the obvious leader. She stood like a statue, flanked by her guards: a pale man in a blue coat and a woman with dark skin and obviously-bleached hair. The man carried a shotgun, smaller than Edith’s, but the woman had a minigun, and she carried it like it weighed nothing. 

Edith faltered, then squared her shoulders and sucked in her gut despite the dull throb radiating outward from her injury. It simply wouldn’t _do_ to appear overly cowed by the Railroad’s display of strength.

“So ask,” she said, trying to sound braver than she felt.

Eyes narrowed, the woman looked down her nose at Edith. “Why are you here?” she said, lips pulled back in a snarl.

Edith looked up at her. “Looking for scavenge,” she said, insolent as a child.

“Right, and you just happened to make your way through the catacombs and past our secret door.” She thumbed the hammer on her six-shooter, the resultant _click_ devastatingly loud in the small chamber. Edith flinched, cursing herself for a fool. Her fingers twitched in empty air, muscle memory crying out for the shotgun lying discarded on the ground. If she reached for it, they’d pump her full of lead before she could blink.

“We both fucking know why I’m here,” she said hoarsely. “You’re the Railroad, and I need your help.” The barrel of the minigun drew Edith’s gaze like a magnet drew iron filings. The woman holding it looked down her nose at Edith, her dark eyes shining and a make-my-day grin on her painted lips.

The leader cleared her throat. “You’re not a synth.”

“How do you know?” challenged Edith, pointlessly defiant even though she was outgunned and outnumbered.

“This isn’t how synths come to us,” said the dark-haired woman. “We have our methods, and this isn’t it. You’re human, and you must have _some_ reason for being here. Out with it.”

“I told you,” Edith growled, “I need help.” She rubbed her injured thigh, wincing at the resultant twinge. “I have a Courser chip--”

“What?” The leader blinked rapidly, her eyebrows shooting up to her hairline. The other two faltered, turning to their leader for guidance. Capitalizing on their momentary distraction, Edith stooped to retrieve her shotgun.

The movement drew the black woman’s eyes. “Hey!” She shifted her stance, but before she could open fire, the other woman stopped her.

“Wait,” she hissed. “You killed a Courser?”

“Sure did,” said Edith, hefting her shotgun. “And I need your help reading the data. I’m hunting the Institute.”

For a moment, no one spoke. Edith’s words hung heavy in the air like the blood-stink of an abattoir, and she began to worry that she’d overplayed her hand.

The woman with the minigun was the first to recover. “She’s crazy,” she said, dismissively. “Or else she’s an Institute infiltrator. I say we kill her and dump her in the bay, leave her body for the Watchers.”

“If the Institute knew where we were, they’d send a full kill team, not a lone gunman,” said the man. His voice was steady, but his hands shook on the stock of his rifle. “We’re not murderers, Glory.”

Edith seized on the name like a dog with a bone. “I’m not looking for a fight,” said Edith. “I need your help, Glory. All of your help. I need the Railroad.”

Glory grimaced. “Keep my name out of your mouth,” she hissed. “Whoever the fuck you are.”

“Edith,” she said. “My name is Edith Mandelbaum.”

Plainly uncomfortable, the man in the blue jacket shifted his weight from foot to foot, the barrel of his gun wavering. He looked sidelong at the leader, waiting for a signal, but she ignored him. The leader stared intently at Edith, gears turning inside her head.

Only Glory was unmoved by Edith’s outburst. Eyes narrowed, she stared down her nose at Edith, her brow furrowed in a sneer. Heart hammering in her chest, Edith met Glory’s gaze and held it, daring the other woman to pull the trigger.

The leader broke the stalemate. “I don’t know who you are,” she said thoughtfully, “but if you killed a Courser, you’re no friend of the Institute.” 

Edith smiled up at her, all teeth. “The enemy of my enemy is my friend.”

The leader looked at her coolly. “Not quite,” she said. “The enemy of my enemy is a _potential_ ally, nothing more.” Her eyes wandering over Edith’s bulging pockets. “I’m going to require a show of good faith before I’m willing to treat with you as anything but a security risk,” she said carefully.

“What,” said Edith, “do you want the chip or something?”

Her only response was a curt nod and a tight-lipped smile.

“No,” said Edith, temper rising. “Absolutely not. If I hand over the chip, you’ll just have your pet psychopath--” she gestured to Glory with her shotgun, and the other pulled her lips back in a snarl, exposing preternaturally white teeth-- “pump me full of lead as soon as my back’s turned.”

“I wouldn’t wait until your back was turned,” Glory muttered darkly.

“ _Enough_.” The leader’s voice was like a gunshot in the small space; both Edith and Glory startled and looked guiltily at her. “My name is Desdemona,” she said. “We’re only as much of a danger to you as you are to us.”

Edith scowled up at her. “You’ve got me outnumbered and outgunned.”

“And you’re trespassing.” Desdemona’s voice was cool, clipped, impersonal. “We can crack the chip. I’d venture that we’re the only ones in the Wasteland who can.” She looked pointedly at Edith, daring her to disagree. “We can’t help you unless you help us. Give us the chip, and we can have the data off it in a week.”

“So what,” she said, “I turn the chip over to you and come back in a week to find this place abandoned? No thanks,” she said, tightening her grip on her shotgun.

The movement drew Glory’s eyes. Her frown deepened, but she didn’t move, even as her gaze flicked from Edith to Desdemona, obviously praying for permission to open fire.

Desdemona remained impassive, indifferent to Glory’s internal power struggle. “You’ll have to surrender the chip to us eventually,” she said. “I would take it as a gesture of friendship if you did so now.”

Edith bit her lip. It wasn’t too late to turn her back on the Railroad. The temptation to walk away was strong, but her feet stayed rooted to the ground. Desdemona, Glory, and the unnamed man represented her best shot at breaching the Institute. She was out of options, and without the Railroad, she was lost.

She sighed, mind made up. “Alright,” she said, her bluster and pride deserting her all at once. “I’m going to reach into my pocket for the chip. Don’t shoot me, please.”

They watched her hands closely as she dug through her pockets and produced the chip. Nestled against her hip, the metal had warmed to match her body temperature; it felt almost like a living thing in her palm. Cotton-mouthed, she crossed the mezzanine like a prisoner going to meet their sentence, and reluctantly dropped the chip into Desdemona’s hand.

Her fist closed around it, and she tucked the Courser chip into her breast pocket, out of sight. As soon as it was gone, Edith felt that she had made a mistake. The Railroad would turn on her, like the Brotherhood. They had what they wanted from her, they had no reason to return it to her. Edith had risen from the dead, had tracked Kellogg to Diamond City and to Fort Hagen, had worn out the soles of her boots on one hundred miles of broken roads. Three months in the Wasteland, and she was no closer to finding Shaun than she had been.

Blinking rapidly, Edith stared up at Desdemona and the others, arrayed like archangels in front of the arc lights, and cursed herself for a fool. Jaw set in a furious line, she crammed her trembling hands down into her coat pockets, groping for her lucky stone. Her fingers closed around the smooth rock and counted her breaths, running her thumb across its polished surface.

"Thank you," said Desdemona formally. "The entire Railroad is in your debt. We won't forget this, I assure you."

Edith smiled up at her, tight-lipped. "All I want is the data," she said tiredly. "I don't care _what_ you do with it, as long as I get a copy of everything."

"Of course." Desdemona smiled a diplomat's smile. "One week, that's all we'll need."

"One week," Edith confirmed. She looked from Desdemona to the man to Glory. For a moment, her gaze lingered on the dark-skinned woman, her pointed nose and painted lips. Edith looked up at her, searching for words. Glory held her gaze, cool and indifferent as granite, and Edith looked away, heart hammering in her chest. "One week," she echoed, her voice barely audible in the dripping cavern. She turned to leave, her heavy tread echoing off the stone walls when a female voice interrupted her stormy thoughts.

"Wait!"

Edith stopped in her tracks and looked over her shoulder at the Railroad. Glory had broken rank, crossed to Desdemona's side. Edith glanced back at the concealed door and the mouth of the tunnel, but Glory's voice caught her like fish hooks and drew her back in.

"We can use her," said Glory, dark eyes trained on Desdemona. "Deacon _has_ to have _something_ for her to do. And it's not like we couldn't use an extra set of hands."

Desdemona studied Edith like a specimen under glass, brows drawn low over her hazel eyes. Edith stared back at her, shoulders squared, unconsciously mimicking Glory's straight-backed posture. "If you're looking for a gun-for-hire," she said, "you won't find better."

Drummer Boy shifted uncomfortably, but Desdemona and Glory exchanged a look. "We don't usually hire independent contractors," she said, and Glory nodded. "Our agents join the Railroad to help synths, not line their pockets. We can't ask anyone to risk their life for a cause they don't believe in."

"I don’t believe in your save-the-synths death wish," said Edith bitterly, “but I’ve got no love for the Institute. They stole from me.” She blinked furiously, and screwed her courage to the sticking place. “At this point, risk my life just to spit in their eye."

Desdemona nodded thoughtfully, a calculating expression on her face. "If you're serious about this," she said slowly. "I'll put you into contact with one of our field agents." She hesitated, choosing her words her carefully. "We’ll compensate you for services rendered when you return for the Courser data." Her hand drifted to the Courser chip in her breast pocket; she clutched at it through the layers of her vest and scarf.

Glory grinned, radiant in the gloom. "God, Deacon is going to have _kittens_ when he hears about this. A new partner: the last thing he never saw coming." She laughed and turned to Edith, her face lively and lovely in its animation. "Hey rookie: don't let him give you a hard time. If he starts telling stories, just hit him until he stops."

Desdemona sighed. "Please don't. Your contact's name is Deacon, he'll rendezvous with you in Bunker Hill." She paused. "Will there be anything else?"

"Yeah, how will I recognize your contact?"

"Sunglasses."

"Sunglasses?" said Edith, incredulous. "That's all you're giving me to go by?"

"That's all you'll need," Desdemona muttered darkly. "Trust me, he makes himself hard to miss.”

\---

Her contact was leaning against the main gate at Bunker Hill, eyes hidden behind dark shades, bald head shining in the late afternoon sunlight. White, runners' build, medium height, somewhere between late thirties and early fifties. He stood out, subtly, although was dressed like every other Brahmin hand in the yard: grimy coveralls, worn flannel work shirt, and shit-caked boots. His posture was wrong, too attentive, too active for the milling crowd. This was a man that wanted to be seen and claimed otherwise.

Edith stopped in front of him and he studied her like an insect under glass. "Do you have a Geiger counter?" he said, stifling a yawn.

"Mine's in the shop."

He nodded, his expression unreadable behind his mirrored sunglasses. "What a relief," he said, without affect. "They told you about the countersign. And here I was worried that they'd sent me a complete greenhorn."

"Deacon, right?" Edith bit back her irritation and stuck her hand out, trying to play at civility and cooperation. "Name's Edith."

He ignored her extended hand. "So I've heard," he said. "And I don't mind telling you: I'm not exactly _excited_ about this arrangement."

She let her hand drop to her side. "They warned me you were an asshole," she said.

He almost smiled. "Lies and slander," he said. "I'm delightful. Come on, let's walk and talk."

She followed him out of the gate and down the street, away from the soaring monument and deeper into the tangle of offices and shops. The cracked streets were overgrown with kudzu and wild aster, and the echoes of their footsteps were muffled by the green carpet. The god-awful harbor stink was softer here, muted by the sharp smell of greenery and the old tang of blood and gunpowder.

"First things first," he said. He had a long stride, and Edith had to take two steps for every one of his. "Field agents do virtually all their communication with HQ via dead drop. You familiar with the term?"

"Vaguely," she said, quickening her pace. "I've read a few spy novels in my day."

"Bless," he said. "That's pretty much where we get all our ideas. Code names, signs, countersigns, dead drops, secret radio frequencies, blood oaths. Good stuff.” He stopped abruptly in the middle of an intersection, sighting down the twisting streets. He turned left, and Edith followed. 

“Anyway,” he said, “we're looking for a dead drop, it's somewhere near the old Mass Chemical building. Check for chalk signs on the mailboxes."

Edith nodded and fell into step behind him, leg aching. She fingered her shotgun and thought of the Courser chip in Desdemona's breast pocket. 'Deacon' and his mission could be a diversion or a decoy, could be an ambush. She didn't like his attitude, she didn't like his mirrored sunglasses. She had met only four members of the Railroad, and so far, she liked none of them.

 _One of them_ , she corrected herself. Glory was alright, if only because she was honest about her intentions. Edith much preferred open hostility to veiled wariness.

Deacon reached a corner and stopped abruptly. Lost in her thoughts, Edith walked into his back, and he turned to frown at her before he gestured down the street. "We got a raider camp down that way," he said, "so we're going to go _that_ way." He pointed west, away from the bridge and the old chemical building.

"How many?"

He frowned, brow furrowing over the rims of his shades. "How many what?"

"Raiders," she said. "There's a camp. How many in it?"

"You're not serious, are you?" He glanced down at her weapon and his frown deepened. "It'd be easier just to go around."

"For us, maybe," she said. "But what about the next caravan that comes down this way? Streets are pretty much impassable if you've got a Brahmin cart."

"Caravans have guards," he said. "And I’m not sure if you noticed, but we're two assholes in leather armor. I don't know _what_ our odds are against an entire camp of screaming chemfiends, but I don't think they're good."

She patted the stock of her shotgun, grinning manically. "This little piece is fully automatic."

He stared at her, dawning horror on his face. "Oh my god," he said. "I get it now. You're one of _those_. Dez is probably hoping you get us both killed so she doesn't have to listen to my puns any more."

"Yeah, with your sunny attitude, I can't imagine why she'd you on suicide missions."

He looked at her for a moment, utterly expressionless. "They send me a heavy with a sense of humor," he said, mostly to himself. "I pray for an infiltrator with a taste for theater, and they send me a heavy with a sense of humor."

Edith rolled her eyes. "Sorry to disappoint," she said. "Maybe I'm not real happy about being out here, either. I bring down a Courser, I hand the chip over to _you people_ on a silver platter, and I get stuck running errands with a cagey asshole. Guess what: this isn't how I wanted to spend my afternoon, either."

"Wait," he said, "back up. You what?"

"What, the Courser thing?"

"Yes, the ' _Courser thing_ ,'" he hissed. "How the hell did you pull that off? There's nobody alive who can take on a Courser single-handed."

"What, like it's hard?"

He stared at her for a long moment. "Have you met Glory yet?" he muttered, "because you two would _really_ get along, god help us all."

"Come on," she said impatiently. "What are we doing, where are we going?"

Deacon sighed. "We're skirting the raider camp," he said. "It's not that I don't believe you, it's that I'm suddenly developing hypertension and all that gunfire and bloodlust is bad for my weak heart. We've got a dead drop to find, come on." He turned and started down the western street, and she had no choice but to follow him, seething.

They passed the rest of the journey in silence, and reached the Mass Chemical building before dusk. As they moved through the shadowed streets, Deacon pointed out symbols chalked on the walls. "Rail signs," he whispered. "We use 'em to communicate out here."

They found the dead drop in a rusted mailbox two blocks south of the regional office. Deacon pulled a ring of keys from his belt, fit one into the lock, and wrested it open. It was empty except for a single holotape, which he tossed to Edith without a second glance. He closed the mailbox and wiped the marking away, signaling to any watchers that the message had been received.

"Go ahead and give that a listen," he said. "Then we're onto phase two."

She fumbled the tape and jammed it into the holoplayer on her Pip-Boy. The recording was grainy, the words difficult to parse amid static: "Window is open for a heavy to make contact, but they should act now. The package is still in my possession."

Blinking, she looked up at Deacon. "What the hell does that mean?"

He sighed. "Stockton's got a synth hiding out in Bunker Hill, and he needs us there. Looks like we're headed back the way we came."

She swore. "Does this happen often?" she demanded. "How often are your people backtracking to chase down these damned dead drops?"

"Goodness, you’re only three hours in, and you've already identified the Railroad’s greatness weakness, aside from numbers, resources, and compassion fatigue," he said. "Well done. Now if you're done complaining, let's beat feet. I don't want to be stranded out here after dark."

"Bet you wish we'd cleared that camp now," she challenging, trailing after him. "Would've been less raiders to dodge on our way back."

"You can walk and talk simultaneous, yes?" he said. "Come on, you can rub it in all the way back. Let's get gone." He started down the darkened street, towards the harbor and Old North Church. Edith sighed, aggrieved, and set off after him, scuffing her feet against the worn asphalt, disturbing dust clouds and tender green shoots. Deacon moved through the falling dark on cats’ feet, and Edith jogged to keep up, her footfalls thunderously loud in comparison.

He stopped once or twice to frown at her; she idly scratched her nose with her middle finger.

They crossed the bridge without incident and found themselves in familiar territory. Skirting the raider camp, they stumbled into a pack of wild dogs. Every shotgun blast was a vindication, wordless “I-told-you-so” pointed in Deacon’s direction. He had the good grace to remain silent as they trudged back to Bunker Hill.

Old Man Stockton was grateful to see them, features going slack with relief at their approach. Sign and countersign, and he gave them their mission details: clear hostiles from the rendezvous point and hold it against the feral ghouls in the area. Stockton would be by with the package, and then a runner would come to escort the synth to a safehouse. Simple, really. Straightforward.

Edith didn’t hesitate to express her irritation, loudly and at length, with both Stockton and Deacon. Deacon was jackrabbit tense beside her and relaxed slightly when he realized that she was veiling all her complaints in metaphor. Angry as she was, Edith chose her words carefully and hid their shared allegiance and the package’s identity in allegory. To eavesdroppers, she was just another hired hand looking to renegotiate the terms of her contract.

“Completely unac-fucking-ceptable working conditions,” she said. “How the fuck’re we supposed to do our goddamn jobs if you’re going to dress up our orders like that? Would a fucking _note_ not have done? We’re all literate here.”

“Keep your voice down,” Stockton hissed. “You must be new around here, missy, because a veteran of our organization would know better than to question our methods.”

“Really?” she shot back, “‘cause I’m starting to think you just like jerking us around.”

They were beginning to attract stares. Stockton dabbed at his shining forehead with a filthy handkerchief, and Deacon tugged at Edith’s sleeve. “Knock it off,” he said, his voice low in her ear. “I get it, you’re pissed off, but you’re going to blow our cover. Settle.”

She jerked her arm from his grasp and glared at him and at Stockton. One of the nearby caravanners cleared his throat and a guard said, “Everything alright there?”

“Fine, fine!” said Stockton, flashing a politician’s smile at their audience. “Just an, ah, disagreement between myself and two of my employees! But I think we’ve reached a resolution.” He turned on Edith, his smile curdling on his thin lips. There was genuine anger in his eyes, and she was immediately ashamed of herself.

“You two should go,” said Stockton icily.

“Sorry,” Edith mumbled, eyes on the ground. “‘S been a long day.”

“All the same,” he said. “You have your next task, _go_.”

Edith went, shamefaced and avoiding eye contact. Deacon followed her out of the settlement. “Well done,” he said drily. “You handled that well, I think.”

“Spare me,” she grumped. “Dead drops are fucking stupid, and you know it.”

He shrugged. “They reduced casualties among runners by two-thirds,” he said softly. “Stockton’s a paranoid old bat, but he’s not wrong. We don’t do the whole cloak-and-dagger routine because it’s fun and exciting. There are lives on the line, ours included.”

She sighed. “Why do you do this?” she asked quietly. “This whole ‘Railroad’ thing. It’s crazy, right? I can’t be the only one who sees that.”

For a moment, Deacon said nothing. “Now _that’s_ the million-cap question, isn’t it? Why do _any_ of us do the things we do? Death’s inevitable and the whole world’s fucked, why bother getting out of bed in the morning?”

“That’s different,” she said hotly.

“How?”

She hesitated. “I don’t know. It just _is_. But you’re still insane to be risking your neck for the synths. I mean, they’re not people, not like you and me.”

“I’m going to have to stop you right there,” he said. “If you genuinely think that way, get out. Go home. You can’t half-ass this; the stakes are too high.”

“I don’t _have_ a home to go back to.”

“Then we’ve reached an impasse.” He sighed. “Seriously, think on it. And by the way: welcome to team Railroad. Our motto is ‘it’s all gone to shit,’ we’ve got it on pins and jackets.”

She snorted. “Inspirational.”

“It’s not supposed to be,” he said. “Now hurry up, we’re burning moonlight.”

\---

They reached the rendezvous point. It was a dingy Protestant church. The wide doors were flung open and the gloomy sanctuary was garrisoned by a pack of feral ghouls. Edith waded into the chaos, swinging her shotgun like a cudgel. She knocked two ghouls to the floor, filled a third with buckshot, and then turned on her heel and shot a fourth. She fell into her stance automatically: knees flexed, feet wide, the butt of her shotgun braced snug against her shoulder, her cheek pressed to the painted stock. There was a rhythm to it, a dance: pivot, aim, shoot, pivot, aim shoot.

She made short work of the ghouls, then turned to Deacon, grinning. He shook his head and shrugged. Edith rolled her eyes and went to work dragging the bloated bodies out into the street. He did not offer to help.

Stockton arrived with the package sometime later. The synth was designated H2-22, and he _looked_ human enough. There was nothing to give away his inhumanity but his rigid posture and affected speech. The synth was too formal, too polite, and Edith was relieved when Deacon suggested that they wait in silence.

They spent a wordless hour in the ruined church, tension humming between them like a storm front. Edith fiddled with her lucky stone, turning it over in her hands so the flecks of mica sparkled in the lantern light. Deacon paced, chain smoking and dropping ash and butts onto the scarred wooden floor. The synth explored the church, peering into shadowed alcoves and running his hands over the wooden altar, his eyes glazed with wonder.

Edith kept the synthetic man in her peripheral vision. He _seemed_ harmless as he plucked an empty Nuka Cola bottle from a garbage bin, but his uncanny nature had her on edge. His movements and gestures were _almost_ human, but every few seconds, his robotic nature would reassert itself in a clinical head tilt or precisely-calibrated side step.

Another fifteen minutes, and the contact arrived: blessedly human, a black man in a slick leather jacket. He introduced himself as High Rise and clapped Deacon on the back, then offered his hand to Edith and H2. His handshake was firm, and he spoke very quickly, bright smile flashing in the dim light as he spoke. "I need your help," he said, voice pitched low. "The old neighborhood's pretty lively tonight; I can't get our guy through all the raiders and muties without help."

"Gosh, it's just too bad nobody killed all those raiders earlier." Edith spoke sardonically, sharp as flint. Her voice carried in the church and they shushed her reflexively.

"How bad is it?" said Deacon. "Any chance to sneak around them?"

"Let me put it this way," said High Rise. "I wouldn't be asking for help if I felt confident about my ability to 'sneak around.'"

Mouth set in a thin line, Deacon nodded. "Alright," he said. "We can get you to Ticon, but we need to get back to HQ. We can't stay there overnight."

"That's just fine," said High Rise. "I'm worried about making it through the streets. Once we get to Ticon, she’ll defend herself."

Deacon nodded. "Well, that settles it," he said, turning to Edith. "Sounds like we've got ourselves an outlet for your bloodlust. Do you want to take point?"

She grinned at him. "I thought you'd never ask."

He gestured out the church door, into the darkened streets. "Lay on, MacDuff."

It was a mile from the rendezvous point to Ticonderoga safe house. Unusually for Boston, the streets were open and straight, wide boulevards lined by darkened buildings and broken streetlights. Crooked alleyways branched off from the main path like snares for the unwary.

Edith kept her head on a swivel, vigilant against the shadows. No attackers appeared, and she had almost begun to relax when Deacon said, “We’re close. Seems like you were overcautious, High Rise.”

Before the agent could respond, the sharp _crack!_ of a high-caliber rifle split the still night. A bullet whizzed past overhead and a harsh female voice cursed and spat, “Get ‘em!”

A dozen raiders emerged from the shadows, brandishing wire-wrapped weapons and dressed in piecemeal armor. Growling, Edith swung her shotgun around and fired into the crowd. One man went down screaming and she pumped the slide and fired again. Deacon and High Rise took up the defense, and Edith dove into the fray, charging. The raiders scattered like roaches, staggering backwards out of her way. They were lightly armed and armored and only half had guns. The rest were equipped with baseball bats or dull knives, blades glinting meanly in the moonlight.

Edith conserved her ammunition and wielded her shotgun like a club, bashing the raiders with the heavy stock. They ducked and ran, and the raiders with guns covered their retreat with erratic fire, bullets snapped past and embedded themselves in the brick wall behind her.

Grinning, she turned back to the others. Deacon and High Rise stood amid a pile of bodies and gore, breathing like they’d run a marathon. H2 wasn’t with them. Edith frowned and opened her mouth to ask where he’d gone; she was interrupted by a piercing scream.

The blood drained from her face. Without hesitating, she dropped her shoulder and ran in the direction of the scream. She plunged blindly into the alley, turning left then right, then left again, and rounded a final corner to find herself in a dead-end alley.

H2 cowered against a dumpster, frozen with terror. Laughing cruelly, a raider advanced slowly, a silvery six-inch knife clutched in their grimy fist.

"Get _down!_ " Edith bellowed, H2 tore his eyes away from his attacker and looked at her dumbly. The raider slashed at him, and the synth cried out, throwing his arms up to protect his face.

Snarling, Edith threw herself at the raider, using her shotgun like a baton to force them backward, away from the panicking synth. Fumbling with the grip and the forestock, Edith swung her weapon around and leveled it at the raider. It was too long for close quarters; she didn’t have enough room to aim.

The raider knocked her barrel aside and lunged at her, knife flashing. Blood roaring in her ears, Edith parried clumsily and forced them backwards again, desperate to give herself enough time and space to aim. Growling in frustration, the raider dropped their knife and drew a pistol from their belt, firing wildly.

Edith got one shot off. It was all she needed. Her round connected with the raider's chest and they staggered backwards, gun slipping from their fingers as they clutched at the wet, fist-sized cavity in their sternum. They were dead before they hit the ground, stumbling backward into the wall before collapsing, face-down, on the asphalt.

Winded, Edith turned to H2. The synth was cowering against the wall, mute and ashen with terror.

"You alright?" she said hoarsely.

"They shot you," he said, his voice small. “You’re bleeding.”

Edith looked down and put her hand to her belly; it came away red. All at once, she became aware of the awful searing pain of torn flesh and spilled blood, she slumped against the wall, cursing.

H2 rushed forward to support her weight. "What's going to happen?" he said, his voice choked with fear. "Are you going to die?"

" _No_ ," she snapped. "I'm _fine._ We have to find the others and get to the safe house." Leaning heavily on H2, she pushed away from the wall and began moving toward the mouth of the alleyway.

Every step was a fresh agony, pain radiating outward from her belly. She imagined she could feel the bullet in her hip, deformed and buried deep in her muscle. She had been shot before, but the pain was different, amplified and reshaped by her irritation and concern for the pale young man -- pale young _synth_ \-- at her side.

He guided her into the main street. Bodies littered the asphalt, but none belonged to Deacon or High Rise. Relief bubbled up in her like champagne and she suppressed the feeling immediately.

 _Don't get involved,_ she reminded herself, _don't get attached._

"Fuck," she said, "where are they?"

H2 swallowed. "Hello?" he called. "Deacon? High Rise?"

"Shut _up_!" she spat, tasting blood on her tongue. "You'll give our position away!"

Footsteps down a side street. Growling, Edith wrenched herself away from H2 and swung her shotgun around, finger twitching against the trigger guard.

"Edith!" Deacon and High Rise appeared around a corner, and Edith sagged in relief. She swayed on her feet, and H2 caught her, slipping an arm underneath her shoulder to keep her upright.

Deacon was limping and High Rise was bleeding freely from a gash on his forehead, but they were alive. Pale behind his sunglasses, Deacon surged forward and caught Edith's other arm, ducking under her shoulder to help H2 support her weight.

"Jesus fucking Christ," he said. "What happened?"

"She saved me," said H2, wonderment in his voice. "There was a bad person with a gun and a knife, and she _saved_ me."

"Did she now?" Deacon looked sidelong at her, and Edith groaned.

"This _hurts_ ," she said. "I'm losing blood pretty fast."

"We're almost to Ticon," said High Rise, "come on, hurry!"

High Rise lead the way and Edith followed, supported by Deacon and H2. The synth babbled nervously, repeating "she _saved_ me," over and over until the words had lost all meaning. Light-headed with pain, Edith swallowed a groan and suppressed the urge to tell H2 to shut the fuck up.

She was relieved when High Rise stopped abruptly. "This is it," he said, gesturing toward a ruined skyscraper. "Come on."

Ticonderoga was situated in the building’s penthouse. The three men hustled her into an express elevator, which shot upward like a rocket. Edith’s ears popped just as the elevator chimed, and she found herself in Ticonderoga. The safehouse was three rooms, all surprisingly clean and comfortable. A combination living and dining room lead into a well-stocked kitchen, and a flight of stairs lead upwards into a dimly light bunk room. A hallway held chemical toilets and humming diesel generators; empty gas cans were stacked neatly in a corner.

“Get her on the table,” Deacon commanded, and H2 and High Rise hastened to follow his orders. They hauled her up onto the kitchen table and pushed her down onto her back. Deacon assumed the lead role: head surgeon of Ticonderoga’s improvised operating theater. “H2, there’s a medkit and a bottle of clear alcohol in the bathroom,” he barked, “I need it _now._ ”

The synth jumped to, and Deacon peeled Edith’s armor off. High Rise appeared at his shoulder with a wickedly sharp knife, and Edith gasped. “It’s alright,” said Deacon, and he cut her blood-soaked shirt away to expose the gunshot wound in her side.

H2 burst into the room, brandishing the medkit and the liquor. Deacon took the medicine and High Rise took the bottle. He held it to Edith’s lips and she drank gratefully. The burn was welcome distraction from the stabbing pain in her gut.

“This is going to hurt,” said Deacon grimly. “Do you want a belt to bite down on?”

“What are you doing to me?” she said, her voice small and choked.

“We have to clean and bind the wound before we administer a Stimpak,” said Deacon, eerily calm despite the blood on his hands. “I’ve got to get the bullet out of you and stitch you up. Do you want something to bite down on?”

She swore and let her head fall back on the counter. “Just fucking kill me.”

“Give her the belt.”

High Rise put the leather to her lips and she accepted it; was grateful when Deacon dabbed at her belly with a liquor-soaked rag. High Rise felt her down and H2 hovered nearby like a pale, anxious ghost.

“Is she going to be alright?” he said, wringing his hands. “Is she going to die?”

Sweating, Deacon ignored him. He dug the bullet out of Edith with a needle and a tweezers. She bit down on the belt, stifling screams, jerking and thrashing in High Rise’s hold. Pain wracked her body and twisted her limbs. The impromptu surgery hurt like childbirth, and she had been anesthetized for _that_.

Distantly, she heard the _clink_ of lead in a glass dish and Deacon began to sew her up. The tug of the needle distant and remote after the agony of removing the bullet, and she had slipped halfway into unconsciousness by the time he finished. She scarcely felt the Stimpak at all.

“Done,” said Deacon. His voice was very distant.

“Will she live?” H2’s voice was choked with anxiety.

“She’ll live,” said Deacon.

“You should get some rest,” said High Rise, his voice pitched low and soothing. “Come on, I’ll show you the bunk room.”

Edith groaned. The liquor and the Stimpak had clouded her head. She felt the pain abstractly; like the death of a distant relative. Unpleasant, but bearable. She groaned again, and Deacon’s pale face swam into focus over her head. “Get some rest,” he said, gently, pushing her hair back off her clammy forehead. “It’s been a hell of a day.”

She fixed him with a baleful stare, then drifted into blissful unconsciousness.

\---

Edith slept for fourteen hours and woke groggy and aching, still on the kitchen table. The Stimpak had done its work; her flesh had knit in her sleep. It still _hurt_ , but the raw pain had faded into a manageable throb. Overnight, her empty belly had grown more pressing than her mostly-healed injury.

Edith rolled onto her side and opened her eyes. Mid-afternoon sunlight poured in through the Venetian blinds, painting the room in soft golden light. There was an overstuffed sofa and a coffee table covered in books and magazines, and a Railroad flag pinned to the wall. H2 napped on the couch, knees drawn up to his chest, thin arms wrapped around thinner legs.

Dozing, dressed in a battered coat and covered in dust and grime, the synth looked very human.

Edith swallowed and looked away. Their gear was piled in the hallway by the elevator, a jumble of broken-in boots, firearms, and canvas bags. Deacon and High Rise were nowhere to be seen: either out on errands or elsewhere in the safehouse.

With a grunt of exertion, Edith sat up and examined her injury. The flesh remembered the bullet: a pale knob of keloid swimming in bruises, reddened flesh bound together by black thread. Deacon’s stitches were very neat and very small, tied off with a small knot. Jaw set, she picked at the knot until it unraveled, then removed the stitches, wincing with every tug.

“You’re awake. How about that.”

Edith looked up sharply; High Rise slouched against the wall. He was barefoot and dressed in an undershirt and patched khaki slacks. He crossed the room and bent to examine her scar, _hmm_ ’ing appreciatively. “Looks good, to me,” he announced. “Deacon knows his stuff.”

“Is he a medic?” she asked, tugging her dirty undershirt down over her belly.

“Deacon? Nah.” High Rise hesitated. “Deeks is more of a dabbler,” he said carefully. “Jack of all trades.”

She slid down off the table and found that her legs were steady enough to support her weight. “Where is he now?”

“He went out to radio HQ and check the dead drops,” he said. “With all the booze and chems we pumped into you, we didn’t think you’d wake up for another couple hours, at least.” He smiled. “You’ve got an iron liver, Edith.”

“Thanks,” she mumbled, and her stomach growled audibly. The Stimpak had accelerated her body’s natural healing response, sapping her energy reserves to fuel tissue growth and t-cell production. “Do you uh, have anything to eat?”

He did. The kitchen was well-stocked, and she felt a pang of Old World nostalgia at the sight of the overflowing pantry: pre-war canned goods and tv dinners, thick tarberry jam, neat rows of pickled carrots and tatoes. Her stomach rumbled, and for a moment, she was paralyzed with indecision. It had been so long since she had the luxury of choice.

She made a meal of pickles and Sugar Bombs. Two centuries past its expiry date, the cereal was stale: textureless and flavorless. To Edith’s changed palate, it was ambrosia, and she ate directly from the box, stuffing greedy handful of cereal into her mouth. The pickles were vinegary and delicious, flavored with an herb she didn’t recognize.

“H2 was worried about you,” said High Rise. He leaned casually on the counter and pitched his voice low. “He wouldn’t sleep in the bunk room. He wanted to make sure you were still breathing.”

Edith swallowed a mouthful of cereal, her throat suddenly dry. “Really?

High Rise nodded. “Yeah. Deacon wanted to slip him dramamine to help him get to sleep, but he finally fell asleep around three.”

Edith stared at H2, wondering what it meant to save a synthetic life. He wasn’t a person, but he’d had an emotional response to her injury. He had practically carried her through the alleys until they found Deacon and High Rise. The synthetic man was small, pitiable, practically child-like in his proportions. Everything about him _seemed_ human, but Edith’s reptile brain recoiled in terror from his uncanny nature. He hadn’t been _born_ , he had been _constructed_ in an Institute laboratory. But like a natural human, he breathed and sweat and bled.

Asleep on the sofa, he _looked_ human, like a young man barely out of boyhood. His conflicting natures spun in her mind like a thaumatrope: man and machine, person and object.

Dizzy, Edith blinked rapidly and looked away. “I’m going to get my things ready,” she said softly. “As soon as Deacon’s back, I need to get out of here.” Swallowing, she decided that she’d be glad to leave Ticonderoga behind.

\---

Deacon returned, empty-handed, just as night fell. He took fifteen minutes to piss and refill his canteen, then Edith and Deacon set out together. They rode the elevator down to the first floor and walked out into the silent streets. Her entire body was a knot of pain: her side ached and her neck prickled with sunburn. Wincing, breathing hard, Edith followed Deacon through the deserted alleys and streets. He chose a convoluted route that skirted raider camps, Brotherhood outposts and Minutemen checkpoints alike. After an hour of walking, they reached an inconspicuous door on the waterfront. It was weathered by sun and salt and sea air, surrounded by crumbling red bricks.

"Let me guess," she said, "Narnia?"

"No, but I appreciate the reference," said Deacon. "This is the back door to HQ. There's a network of connected tunnels, and I need you to pay attention, because I'm only going to show you the route once."

She nodded. "What happens if I can't remember it?"

He stared at her, his expression unreadable behind his mirrored shades. "You get lost and the ferals eat ya," he said seriously.

Edith blinked, and Deacon laughed.

"Nah, you'll get really turned around, but someone would come looking for you before it came to that. Glory goes through a couple times a week with her minigun to keep it clear. If we're evacuating, the last thing we need is to get caught up in a firefight." He shrugged, one-shouldered. "Come on, let's get under cover."

He turned the knob and tugged; the door stuck in the frame. It swung open after a sharp jerk. Edith was quietly disappointed that there was no hidden mechanism or secret knock.

The tunnels were less confusing than she had feared. Not really tunnels, but passageways dug between adjoining basements, the openings reinforced with steel girders. The path was lit by lanterns, a subtler messaging system than the obvious chalk tags elsewhere in the church.

Ten minutes in the tunnels, and they emerged in the Railroad headquarters: a cavernous crypt, electronic equipment and yellowed paper stacked haphazardly on every available surface. Desdemona stood at a central table, her back to the tunnel doorway, deep in conversation with a short, dark man in a crisp white doctors' coat. The man in the blue coat -- Drummer Boy, Deacon had mentioned his name in passing -- lingered by a computer terminal, chatting to a skinny black man in grimy overalls and a foil-lined cap. Edith glanced around the room, searching for Glory and finding her nowhere.

More distracting than the other woman's absence was a rich scent of gravy and stewed meat; Edith's stomach rumbled audibly.

Deacon cleared his throat. "Aw, did we miss dinner?"

Drummer Boy nodded in greeting and his companion waved; Desdemona and the doctor turned on Deacon and Edith with impatient frowns etched into their faces.

"Well?" said Desdemona, blunt as a brick to the face. "How did she do?" She spoke to Deacon as though Edith weren't standing beside him with gunpowder and blood caked underneath her fingernails.

Edith rankled at her tone, but Deacon took it in stride. "The new meat did fine," he said, waving his hand dismissively. "But that's all you're getting out of me until you get some food _in_ me."

Desdemona sighed and gestured vaguely at a pre-war stove in the back corner of the massive room. "Dinner's on the stove," she said. "I expect a full report tonight."

"Yes mother dearest," said Deacon, sharp as nails. "Shall I wash up? Put on my Sunday best?" He spoke sardonically, but there was warmth in his tone: prickly words built up around a core of familiarity and genuine fondness.

Edith amended her first impression of Deacon to make room for his friendship with Desdemona. She had already decided that she disliked the Railroad as a whole: disliked the secrecy and the codes, disliked the demands and the inefficiency. Its members were mostly assholes: hard-assed Desdemona, flighty Deacon, milquetoast Drummer Boy. She hadn't made up her mind about the black man in the coveralls, but the doctor was looking at her like she'd tracked dog shit all over the carpeting.

The only one worth a damn, in Edith's reckoning, was Glory.

She glanced around to confirm the other woman's absence, then followed Deacon to the makeshift kitchen. The pot on the stove contained stewed venison in a brown gravy: beans and little shreds of meat, mushrooms, and crosscut carrots. The stew was only lukewarm, but it smelled invitingly of paprika and black pepper. Edith served herself a generous portion and Deacon took the remainder, scraping the bottom of the pot to get up all the carrots and gravy.

Edith settled herself in a corner with her dinner and ate ravenously. The stew was quite good by post-war standards, and it took everything in her not to lick her bowl clean. Instead, she looked around the room, studying the sundry members of the Railroad.

Desdemona was arguing with the doctor, gesturing violently at a map spread across the central table. He was scowling at her, brow furrowed, arms folded over his chest. Drummer Boy and his companion -- boyfriend, judging by their familiarity and easy intimacy -- stood shoulder-to-shoulder, murmuring to one another as the taller man fiddled with the terminal, fingers clacking on the keyboard.

Deacon noticed her interest in the other agents. "That's Doc Carrington," he said, pointing. "And that's Tinker Tom. He’s nuttier than a shithouse rat, but he's good people." Tom pecked Drummer Boy on the cheek, stooping to kiss the smaller man.

Deacon almost smiled. "Dez said you already met Glory, and all that's left after her is PAM."

"What, no code name for Pam?"

"PAM is an acronym," he said. "Stands for Predictive Analytic Machine." He licked his spoon. "She's a robot."

"You're shitting me."

"I shit you not!” he said cheerily. “PAM is uh, a singular entity. She's great, she's just." He scratched his head. They'd been outside for hours, but he had mysteriously failed to acquire a sunburn despite his fair skin and reddish eyebrows. "She's a little hard to describe. She’s _also_ good people."

"And where's Glory?"

Deacon looked at her sideways, his eyebrows raised over his sunglasses. "I don't know," he said, "why do you ask?"

"No reason," she said quickly, shoveling stew into her mouth. "Jus' curious."

"She's probably out running errands," said Deacon, shrugging. "Dez and Carrington keep her pretty busy these days."

Edith set her spoon down. "What does she _do_ , though? Is she just muscle?"

"There's nothing 'just' about Glory," he said. "But essentially, yeah. She's what we call 'a heavy.' Mostly, she makes runs like the one we did tonight, but she also keeps our routes in and out of the 'Wealth clear."

"By herself?" said Edith. "Isn't that dangerous?"

"Excuse me," he said, "did you not try and convince me to storm a raider camp earlier today? Why the sudden concern for safety?"

"I--" Edith felt her face growing warm. "No reason."

He fixed her with a quiet, intense stare. "If you say so."

"What _ever_ ," she said, casting about for a change of subject. "What do _you_ do, then? Besides irritating everyone, I mean."

"That _is_ what I do," he said cheerfully. "Jokes and light espionage."

Edith rolled her eyes. "Seriously," she said. "You're not in charge, that's Dez. You're not even second-in-charge, but you're obviously in charge of _something_."

"And what makes you say that?" he asked, his voice pointedly casual.

She shrugged. "When I showed up, they said 'give her to Deacon, he'll have something for her to do.' You know everyone and everything, or you act like you do. Plus you brought me into HQ, and no one said anything. Dez made it sound like I'd never get to see the inside of this place, but you just brought me in here like it didn't even matter." Another half-shrug. "Seems to me like you've got _some_ sort of authority around here."

"You pay attention," he said, a note of approval in his voice. "Alright, fair enough. I'm the Railroad's senior intelligence officer."

She ran her finger around the rim of her bowl. "And what does that mean, exactly?"

"Jack of all trades," he said, leaning back in his seat. "I do a bit of this and a bit of that. Mostly, I just travel the 'Wealth and gather data. Check in on our tourists."

"Tourists?"

"Non-HQ agents," he said. "People like Stockton."

She nodded, chewing her lip. "Do you do the dead drops, too?"

"Nope. That's Drummer Boy."

"So you're the intelligence guy, Drummer Boy does logistics, and Glory kills stuff?" Edith tapped her fingers against her leg, glancing around HQ, trying to memorize all the names and faces.

"More or less." He hesitated. "And since you've just pumped me for information, now seems like a good time to say 'pretty please don't sell us out to the Institute or the Brotherhood.'"

"I wasn't planning on it,” she said staunchly. "All I want is the data off the Courser chip.”

He sighed. "Look, I don't want to start a fight with you, 'cause I know you'd kick my ass. I just want to restate the precariousness of the Railroad's situation and maybe play on your innate sympathy for scrappy underdogs."

Edith snorted. "Try again, wise guy. And maybe this time, you could play on my innate love of money."

"Yeah, well, 'the love of money is the root of all evil,'" he said, "and I'm relatively confident that you're not a bad person."

"Only relatively confident?"

"These are desperate times, Edith. I don't know if you noticed, but we're a little understaffed right now. You could be _exactly_ what we need.”

"Well, sorry to disappoint."

"You haven't yet," he said quietly.

Edith had no response to that.


	2. Chapter 2

After dinner, there was an intense conversation with Deacon, Carrington, and Desdemona. Carrington was furious that Deacon had brought Edith to HQ without clearance, and he expressed his misgivings loudly and at length. “It is completely irresponsible,” he said, red-faced with anger. “A total violation of protocol and common sense! We don’t know _anything_ about this woman.”

Deacon shook his head. “She took a bullet for the package. And I wouldn’t have brought her in if I thought she was a security risk,” he said. “She’s safe, give me a _little_ credit--”

“You can’t know that!” Carrington exploded. “ _Really_ , Deacon, what were you thinking?”

Edith tamped down her irritation and bit her lip, forcing herself to remain silent. _You need these people_ , she reminded herself. _At least until you get the chip back._

“That’s enough,” interrupted Desdemona, fishing a matchbox from her pocket and lighting another cigarette. “What’s done is done. It’s not ideal--” she frowned at Deacon, daring him to interrupt “--but this may be a blessing in disguise.” Her teeth and fingernails were stained yellow from years of tobacco use.

“What do you propose?” said Carrington archly.

Deacon responded before Desdemona could open her mouth. “Make her an agent,” he said.

“What?” Edith and Carrington spoke in unison.

“It’s not the usual process,” Deacon admitted, “but if she took down a Courser single-handed _and_ she’s willing to take a bullet for synthkind, then we want her on _our_ side. We _need_ another heavy, someone to lighten Glory’s load.”

Edith felt a headache coming on, a dull pulsing throb behind her eyes, an imperfect accompaniment to the lingering ache of the healed gunshot wound. “This is insane,” she said. “You’re all insane.”

Desdemona sighed. Less than five minutes, and she’d smoked her cigarette down to the filter. “Let’s table this for now,” she said, dropping the butt in an overflowing ashtray. “It’s late. We can have this conversation tomorrow.”

The doctor threw his hands up. “Are you seriously considering this? Letting this stranger become an agent? Does no one remember what happened at Switchboard?”

Desdemona’s glare could have stopped a supermutant in its tracks. Carrington blanched; Edith was quietly grateful to to be passed over.

“We will continue this discussion tomorrow,” she said archly. “Good night.”

Carrington slunk away, and Edith and Deacon exchanged an uneasy look. “We’re just one big dysfunctional family,” he said quietly. “With guns!”

Edith snickered, and her laughter turned into a yawn halfway through. It was past midnight and she was asleep on her feet. Stifling another yawn, she peeled off her leather armor and collapsed on one of the lumpy communal mattresses. She slept uneasy, troubled by dreams of the Vault and the Glowing Sea. After six hours of fitful sleep, she gave up. She abandoned her mattress and wandered back to the center table to examine Desdemona’s map of the Commonwealth.

It was pre-war, salvaged from a schoolhouse and laid flat on the enormous round table, the corners weighted down with bricks and overflowing ashtrays. The map was heavily annotated, safe houses and railways marked out in chalk and permanent marker. Edith traced the routes with her fingertip and wondered whether the Railroad’s influence extended beyond the edge of the map.

The tunnel door banged and Edith looked up, startled. Glory staggered in, deep bags under her eyes, lugging her enormous minigun. Dressed plainly in an oversized coat and white scarf, she stopped short and stared at Edith, dark eyes wide. “What are _you_ doing here?” she said, more confused than angry.

Edith swallowed, unaccountably nervous. “Deacon brought me here,” she said. “He wants to make me a full agent.”

Glory blinked rapidly. “Wait,” she said, “what? I thought you were little miss mercenary.”

“I _am_ , she insisted. “He made the offer, but I don’t know if I’m taking him up on it.”

“Then why the hell are you in HQ?” she said. She crossed the room and hauled her minigun up onto Tinker Tom’s workbench. “We got protocols for bringing in new agents, and this isn’t it.”

“Carrington said the same thing.”

Glory snorted. “Yeah, well, Carrington’s a massive tool. If he had his way, there’d be nobody in HQ ‘cept for him and Dez.” She raked her white hair back off her face and leaned casually on the workbench to study Edith, dark eyes shining like bronze. “So fuck him, I guess. How’d the mission go?”

Staring at Glory, Edith was struck by the urge to embroider her story, add a few heroic flourishes. After a moment’s consideration, she came to her senses and decided to relay the facts as she had seen them, without embellishment. “It was alright. We walked all over hell’s half-acre, looking for a dead drop, and then we escorted a synth to Ticon. It got messy; we took some fire.”

“No shit?” Glory sounded vaguely impressed, and Edith glowed with pleasure. “Come on girl, I need details. How messy? Was it exciting? Did Deacon piss his pants?”

Edith laughed, cheeks growing warm. “Probably not exciting by your standards,” she admitted. “We got ambushed by about a dozen raiders, and the synth ran off down an alley. I went off after him.”

“I heard you took a bullet for him,” said Glory, leveling her gaze like a weapon.

Flushing, Edith faltered under the weight of the other woman’s scrutiny. “Uh, yeah,” she said, reaching into her pocket for her lucky stone. “That happened. I mean, I meant to kill the bastard before they got a shot off, but what can you do?”

“Shoot them first,” said Glory decisively. “Did you at least get a cool scar out of it?”

She swallowed. “Yeah,” she said, “wanna see?”

Glory smiled, all sharp edges and dazzling teeth. “‘Course,” she scoffed. “What kind of question is that?”

Edith held her breath and rucked up the hem of her flannel, exposing her hipbone and belly. The scar was an ugly knot of keloid, a small, pale crater surrounded by a fist-sized bruise.

The bruise was a sunset in miniature: vividly purple and searing red, edged in yellow. Glory hissed sympathetically and reached out gingerly, laying cool fingers on the healing bruise. Edith sucked in a sharp breath and Glory drew back her hand as though burned. “You alright?”

“Fine,” she said, pointedly avoiding eye contact. “It’s still a little tender.”

“I’ll bet,” Glory murmured. She was taller than Edith, broader in the chest and shoulders, and she smelled faintly of perfume and gunpowder. Her hands were cool and unbearably gentle as she probed Edith’s scar, admiring its size and color. “It’s beautiful,” she said, measuring the bruise against her hand.

Shivering, Edith looked up at the other woman, her lips parted. Glory stood close enough to kiss. If Edith tipped her head backward and leaned in, their lips would brush.

Their eyes met. They stood frozen for a moment, then the other woman stepped back abruptly, cheeks glowing faintly red. Edith swallowed a surge of disappointment and tugged her shirt back down to hide the scar. “How about you?” she said, her voice strange and harsh to her own ears. “What’ve you been up to?”

Glory shrugged, pointedly avoiding eye contact. “Kicking ass,” she said vaguely. “Taking names.”

Edith nodded. “You’re a heavy, right?”

“Yup,” said Glory, cheerily, her voice falsely bright like an incandescent bulb. “That’s me. The ass-kicking poster child of a liberated synth.”

Edith blinked in confusion. “Synth?”

“What, haven’t you heard?” said Glory sardonically, all traces of her earlier tenderness melting away. “There’s these bad scientists making fancy robots and settin’ ‘em loose on the ‘Wealth.”

“You’re a synth?” Edith stared at her. H2 had been painfully inhuman, but Glory had no tells. She looked human, sounded human, _smelled_ human.

“And you’re slower n’ molasses,” Glory teased. “Yeah, I’m a synth. Got a problem with that?”

 _Yes_ , Edith thought.

She shook her head frantically. “Of course not,” she said automatically. “If I had a problem with synths, I wouldn’t be joining the Railroad, now would I?”

Glory’s eyes narrowed. “I thought you were still undecided.”

“I, uh.” Edith swallowed. “I might’ve made up my mind. You’re good people, I think.”

“Listen.” Glory squared her shoulders and drew herself up to her full height. “I don’t care who you are or _how_ many Coursers you killed. The Railroad is my family, and you don’t get to just waltz in here and talk shit. You’re not onboard, you get the fuck out. Now.”

Edith glared at her. “I’m here for the data,” she said hotly. “That’s all.”

“Yeah, well, _I’m_ here because people keep murdering synths,” spat Glory. “I think we’ve got a case of irreconcilable differences.”

“I got my own people to worry about,” said Edith. “I can’t take on all of yours.”

“And I’m not asking you to.” Glory’s voice was frayed, worn thin from irritation. “Jesus. We’re not asking you to play savior, we can care of ourselves.Get over yourself, Eddy.”

“Eddy?”

Glory rolled her eyes. “Ever heard of a nickname, dipshit? _God_ you’re slow.” She turned on her heel and stalked off before Edith could respond, turning a corner and disappearing into the dim recesses of the catacombs. Edith was left staring after her, her heart beating furiously behind her breastbone.

 

\---

There wasn't time to dwell on her argument with Glory. As soon as Desdemona woke up, she sent Edith and Deacon out on another errand. They spent the morning in the North End, clearing a path into Goodneighbor for High Rise and H2. Popping ferals was a welcome distraction from Edith's simmering irritation, and when she returned to Railroad HQ at noon for lunch, Tinker Tom sent her right back out again with "MILA," a bulky piece of monitoring equipment, and a vague directive to "put her up real high."

She spent a pleasurable afternoon exploring a ruined skyscraper. As it transpired, Deacon was deathly afraid of heights, and he remained in the lobby with a pack of cigarettes and the latest copy of _Publick Occurences_ while Edith picked her way through the ruined apartments. The building was largely deserted, except for a few stray ghouls and a badly-damaged Protectron. She attached the MILA to an exposed girder in the destroyed penthouse, then rode the elevator all the way to the first floor to find Deacon napping on a moldering sofa.

For a moment, she considered playing an immature prank: hiding his sunglasses or drawing a dick on his face in permanent marker. She stifled a laugh, and Deacon stirred, rolling over to face her. "Did you get the MILA in position?"

"Followed the directions to the letter," she said. "Just now, were you actually asleep, or just pretending?"

"Does it matter?"

"Not really."

"Then let's get a move on," he said, sitting up and stretching. "If we time this right, Desdemona will be in a meeting when we get back, and too distracted to issue more orders. Come on."

They returned and found the assembled HQ agents in the midst of a family-style dinner. Ramen noodles simmering in an oversalted broth with chunks of vegetables and fatty stripes of molerat belly. Edith took a beer and a plate of food and sat down between Deacon and Tinker Tom, pointedly avoiding Glory's eye. The other woman -- the _synth_ \-- frowned at her and said nothing.

The beer and the noodles were very good by Pre-War standards. Edith slipped her molerat into Deacon's bowl and ate without speaking to anyone.

The stagnant crypt air was thick with tension. Water dripped down the walls in rivulets, leaving slick mossy trails on the rough stone walls. They ate without speaking, searching the silence for an inoffensive topic.

Only Deacon was undeterred by the lingering awkwardness; he talked animatedly and gestured with his chopsticks while everyone else listened in polite, disinterested silence. Edith ignored him and turned her focus onto the other members of the Railroad. Desdemona sat at the head of the table, holding her fork like a cigarette and chewing furiously. Carrington scowled at Deacon; Tom and Drummer Boy held hands underneath the table. Glory sat on Deacon’s left, rolling her eyes at his unending chatter. She ate noisily, her fork held overhand in a clenched fist.

Glory drew Edith’s eyes like light drew moths. Her bleached hair shone in the fluorescent lights, brilliantly white in the gloom. More than once, she caught Edith staring and _glared_ , dark eyes narrowing to slits. Edith looked away whenever the other woman caught her staring, heat rising in her cheeks.

After dinner, Desdemona cleared her throat. "It's been a while since anyone's cleared out the tunnels," she said, tapping her fork against the scarred table. "Edith, Glory, if you don't mind."

Edith glanced sidelong at the other woman, but Glory refused to look directly at her. "Sure," said Glory, sounding bored. "Whatever."

"No problem,” said Edith. “As long as Glory doesn't mind me tagging along."

Desdemona nodded decisively. "Alright, then," she said. "That settles it. The two of you will take care of the tunnels, and then we'll all have a quiet night in. Knock wood, we won't have any new crises to deal with until tomorrow morning." She rapped her knuckles against the table and returned her attention to her food.

After dinner, Edith cleaned and oiled her shotgun and changed into her leathers. Armed and armored, she followed Glory through the door, into the escape tunnels. Over the years, the bay seeped in through the cracks in the limestone, flooding the tunnels and coating the rough walls with slick moss. The smell was unbearable.

Edith gagged; Glory pulled her white scarf up over her nose. She waded into the knee-deep water without a backwards glance, and Edith followed, cursing and spluttering as the cold, stinking water soaked through her clothes and filled her boots.

Glory moved quickly despite the weight of her minigun and armor. She seemed unaffected by the chill and stench of the rancid water. Grinding her teeth in frustration and subdued admiration, Edith quickened her pace to keep up with Glory. The scummy water concealed uneven terrain. More than once, Edith slipped on a moss-covered stone and nearly lost her footing. Each time, she caught herself on the disgusting wall, crying out in alarm and smearing moss and mold all along her front.

Her shouts were thunderously loud in the cavernous tunnels, echoes bouncing along the limestone walls. The other woman -- _synth_ , Edith reminded herself, _she's a synth_ \-- didn't break stride.

"You coming?" she called, voice tinged with irritation. "The sooner we finish rounds, the sooner we can get into dry clothes."

"You walk too fast," Edith snapped.

Glory rounded a corner and disappeared from view. "You walk too slow," she said, her words echoing strangely in the tunnel. Her mocking voice mingled with the lapping of the water, musical and merciless as the rising tide. "You got short little legs."

"My legs are not short! _Your_ legs are too damned long." Glory snorted and her splashing footsteps halted. Breathless and huffing, Edith rounded the corner and nearly collided with the other woman.

The dim amber light of Edith's Pip-Boy cast lovely shadows on Glory's angular face. Edith had been half in love with her since they’d met, but in that moment, she was beautiful and terrible. An avenging angel: wheels of flame and eyes within eyes, a booming voice. _Be not afraid._

Edith gasped, actually gasped, the sharp little sound reverberating in the dim cavern.

Glory looked down her nose at her, brow furrowed. "What?"

"Nothing," said Edith, swallowing. "Let's go, yeah?" She turned to hide the flush creeping up her neck. Glory chuckled, a low rumble like distant thunder. The sound crept down Edith's spine and she had a sudden, vivid fantasy of the other woman pinning her to the wall with one muscular thigh slotted between Edith's spread legs.

"I think you've got a crush on me, Eddy."

"I--" Edith whirled around, lips pressed in a thin line. Glory was _laughing_ at her, dark eyes shining with mirth.

Edith stared at her for a moment, jaw stuck shut.

Glory snickered. "You're cute when you're not talking," she teased.

"Shut up," Edith muttered.

"Seriously," said Glory. "You blush cute."

"I thought you hated me."

Glory shrugged. "I think you're a huge tool, and I think you got a lot to learn. About the Railroad, about synths, whatever. But you _are_ pretty cute, when you're not talking out your ass."

"I'm sorry," said Edith, swallowing. "About earlier. You caught me off-guard, and I was talking faster than I was thinking. I was a dick."

"You were."

"I'm sorry."

"Fuck it, I don't care," said Glory, no menace in it. "Look, I don't really know why you're here. I don't know why you're after the eggheads, I don't know why that Courser chip matters so much to you.” She glared, eyes ablaze. “But the rest of us believe in the Railroad and everything it stands for. It's--"

She swallowed, and Edith realized that she was on the verge of tears. All her anger and bluster had burned out, leaving her vulnerable heart exposed. Edith immediately felt like shit for doubting her, for doubting the Railroad, for doubting the synths--

Glory took a deep, steadying breath. "It's everything,” she said, bluntly. “This isn't a concept, or a thought exercise or whatever. I'm doing this, because the Institute made synths to be slaves, and it's _wrong_." She spoke passionately and a little self-consciously, her voice breaking a on the last word. "I'm a synth, and I'm damned proud of it. This is who I am. This matters."

Guts knotted in shame, Edith nodded. "I don't know if I understand," she admitted, fingers dipping into her pocket to play with her lucky stone. "I don't know if I can. I've never cared about anything the way you care about the Railroad. It's just--it's not something I've ever dealt with in my life."

"But you're willing to learn," said Glory. "That counts for something, sorta. I mean, I don't want to play teacher and tell you all about synth identity or whatever. I just want to shoot stuff, kill Coursers. Make a stand."

"I understand that, at least," said Edith softly, squeezing the stone. "Actions, not words."

"Exactly," said Edith. "And your words are fucking stupid, but your actions've been alright. I'm willing to give you a chance if you're willing to keep trying." She grinned unsteadily, vulnerability masked in sharp humor once more. "I'd offer to shake on it, but you're all covered in muck."

Edith made a rude gesture, and Glory laughed again. "Come on," she said, dimpling attractively. "Let's go."

She turned and started down the tunnel, but she slowed her stride to match Edith's. Heart soaring, Edith fell into step beside her, shotgun clutched to her chest like a favorite toy.

Their round took an hour, and they encountered no trouble along the way. Glory said there'd been a nest of ferals in one of the side passages; she seemed almost disappointed that they hadn't come back. "Not getting any action tonight," she muttered, and Edith laughed.

The door to HQ stood on a landing raised slightly above the murky canal. Glory paused there, leaning up against the rail to light a cigarette. Edith watched, fascinated by the movement of her hands and the way the light reflected in her dark eyes.

“Can you smoke?” she asked, abruptly.

“I’m doing it right now, aren’t I?”

“Sorry. I just meant -- do you have lungs? How does it work?”

Glory raised an eyebrow.

“Stupid question,” said Edith. “Sorry.” For a moment, Edith was silent, rolling the unlit cigarette between her palms. “I got a big goddamn mouth on me.”

Glory looked at Edith for a moment, and her frown broke into an irresistible grin. She smiled, wide enough to show her molars. “Damn right you do,” she said. “But it’s not all bad. You’re tough, and you don’t take shit, even from Deacon.” Her dark eyes flicked down to Edith’s chest. “And you learn quick. I like that.”

“Oh?”

“Yeah.” Glory leaned a little closer and took a half-step into Edith’s space. She was close enough that Edith could see the pores on her dark skin.

Mouth dry, heart fluttering, she swallowed and tried to think of something clever to say. “That’s cause I’ve got a good teacher.” The words fell like stones from her mouth, awkward and heavy. She cringed inwardly.

Glory laughed--with her or at her, Edith couldn’t tell. She joined in nervously, her voice strange to her own ears, and the other woman leaned back against the wall, a smirk tugging at her lips. “God, you’re high-strung. Do you _ever_ relax, Eddy?”

“No,” said Edith. “I don’t know how.” She stuck the cigarette between her teeth for want of something to do with her hands. Glory leaned in to light it, and Edith held her breath.

“Could teach you,” said Glory, her voice low and husky. “Bet you’d learn that quick, too.”

Blushing furiously, Edith took a long drag. She held the smoke in for a count of two before she exhaled, smoke curling from her lips and nostrils. Glory watched, eyes glinting in the dim light, close enough to kiss.

  
  


Someone cleared their throat; Glory and Edith turned in guilty unison. Deacon stood in the doorway to HQ, grinning weakly. “Hey party people,” he said, his voice full of false cheer. “What’s up?”

Edith took a step backwards, recoiling from Glory like she’d been caught with her hand in the cookie jar. “Nothing,” she said, cheeks burning. She kept her eyes on the ground, the lit cigarette jutting from her clenched jaw.

“That’s just what I like to hear,” said Deacon. He sidled up and leaned up against the wall, forcefully casually. “PAM’s looking for you, Glory. Got another rogue variable needs solving for.”

“Great,” said Glory sourly. “Another fucking Courser. What happened to our quiet night in?”

“Hey,” he said. “I’m just reporting out. If you don’t like your assignments, take it up with the omniscient killbot.”

She shot him a dirty look and stomped away, letting the door slam behind her. It sounded like a rifle in the enclosed space; Edith jumped. Her startle reflex had worn tissue-paper thin in the months since she left the Vault.

A moment of silence, and Deacon cleared his throat. “Hey,” he said. “Can I offer you some friendly, unsolicited advice?”

Edith scowled at him, cheeks still red. “You certainly may not.”

“Too bad. Here it comes: don’t sleep with Glory.”

She stared at him for a moment, trying and failing to convey the depth of her irritation without opening her mouth. “I don’t see how that’s any of your business,” she said archly.

“Look,” he said, lowering his voice. “I’ll say this once, and then I’ll let it drop. Sleeping with coworkers is _always_ a bad idea, but it’s an especially bad idea when your entire organization consists of seven assholes and a predictive text generator. We can’t afford to make mistakes or let our emotions get in the way. Agents need to keep a clear head at all times, and sex tends to muddy the waters.”

“Did you have this talk with Tom and Drummer Boy?” Edith folded her arms over her chest. “Because I don’t see how--”

“That’s different,” said Deacon impatiently. “Tom and Drummer aren’t ever in the field together. Plus, I don’t think they’ve ever actually fucked. It’s just hand-holding and eskimo kisses, all the way down.”

“Glory and I aren’t ever in the field together, either.”

“No, but you _could_ be.” He ran his hands over his shaved head. “Dez only lets Drummer and Tom slide because Tom doesn’t leave HQ. Ever. You and Glory are in and out, it’s only a matter of time before--”

“Save it,” Edith interrupted. “My sex life is none of your business.”

He lifted his hands in mock surrender. “Fine. You win. Just forget I said anything, and don’t come crying to me when everything goes to hell.”

“God, you are _such_ an ass,” she snapped. “Fuck off, Deacon.”

“Gladly.” He pushed off from the wall with a violent gesture, stalking down toward HQ, his footfalls eerily silent on the cracked concrete. Edith raised her middle finger and glared at his retreating back, then slumped against the wall and lit another cigarette.

“Fuck me,” she said tiredly, her voice echoing along the tunnel.

 

\---

It was two weeks before she saw Glory again. The other woman’s work kept her away for days at a time, and Tom and Drummer Boy kept Edith and Deacon busy. They spent their days running and fetching all over Boston, retrieving dead drops and placing MILAs. It became a routine: leave at dawn, make a circuit to check the dead drops in and around downtown Boston, climb a few towers and place a few MILAs, return after sundown. When they returned from HQ, Edith ate a plate of whatever was leftover from dinner and collapsed onto a filthy mattress, too exhausted to make conversation.

Deacon was as good as his word. He kept up a steady stream of chatter in the field, but he didn’t mention Glory again. He talked endlessly about the books he’d read and the exciting places he’d been, but he was noticeably silent on the subject of interpersonal relationships. At some point, he handed her a slip of paper with ‘You can’t trust everyone’ written in a scrawling hand that she knew wasn’t his. It wasn’t friendship, but it was something like it: diet friendship, half the companionship with none of the calories.

Edith thought about Glory a lot. Her crack-toothed smile, her calloused hands, the way her bleached hair fell in front of her eyes in a dirty grey cascade. At night, Edith kept herself company with a hand between her legs, her eyes screwed shut while she replayed their last conversation over and over again in her head, imagining Glory’s rough hands and soft mouth. If Deacon knew or suspected what she was doing and who she was thinking about, he gave no sign of it.

_Could teach you. Bet you’d learn that quick, too._

The next time Edith ran into Glory in HQ, the other woman greeted her like a stranger. Edith swallowed her disappointment down like whiskey and recalled Deacon’s words. Maybe he’d spoken with Glory; maybe she’d agreed with him.

It hurt. All the sting of rejection, with none of the certainty. Could be that Glory wasn’t interested, could be that she was only biding her time. There was nothing Edith could do except wait and watch and wish that Glory would give her a clear answer: yes or no. Until then, Edith would keep torturing herself with fantasies about the other woman.

Glory’s mouth on her clit, two long fingers shoved up inside Edith’s pussy and working her into a frenzy. Glory’s pretty mouth twisted into a moan while Edith licked a trail down her chest. Fucking against a wall, in a bed, in the bath. Lazy mornings in bed together, kissing and caressing without taking their clothes off. Her name on Glory’s lips, a whispered plea as she came against Edith’s hand, _Eddy, Eddy, Eddy--_

Edith shivered, biting her lips to stifle a moan. Her spine curled as orgasm overtook her, and she fucked herself through it with her thumb on her clit and two fingers in her cunt. Trembling, she wiped her sticky fingers on her undershirt. She sighed in contentment, languid and loose-limbed, relaxing for the first time in _days_. She’d spent a long week in the field with Deacon, chasing rumors of a Brotherhood cache in an abandoned farm house. Six hours in the hot sun, crisscrossing fallow fields and repelling packs of wild dogs, and they had found a single suit of power armor, too badly damaged for salvage. Deacon made some fucking stupid joke and Edith tried very hard to resist the urge to strangle him.

They had camped for the night in the hayloft of an empty barn, bedding down in a pile of scratchy, desiccated hay. Edith slept uneasy and woke before dawn with a familiar, needy ache in her nether regions. She brought herself off easy enough and settled back into the hay, tallying sums in her mind.

It had been three weeks since she’d found the Railroad. Tinker Tom had been working on the Courser chip since she’d turned it over to Desdemona, but he was no closer to decrypting its data. For all his eccentricity, he was remarkably cautious and methodical. “It’s a delicate operation,” he’d said, pushing his goggles back off his forehead and rubbing his eyes. “Courser chips are real ticklish. One wrong move, and the damn thing’ll brick itself. I think I’m getting close, but--”

Edith sighed. Desdemona hadn’t made a believer of her yet, but remaining with the Railroad was expedient as the promised ‘one week to crack the chip’ stretched on interminably. She’d tried very hard to convince herself that her interest in their organization was strictly professional, but every time she saw Glory, her world tilted dangerously on its axis. They hadn’t fucked, hadn’t even _kissed_ , but Edith was lovesick over her. Things had been _clearer_ before she met Glory.

_Sex tends to muddy the waters._

On the other end of the hay loft, Deacon stirred. He slept with the sunglasses on; Edith was past being weirded out by it. The man was committed to his gimmick and to the Railroad, everything else was secondary.

“Good morning,” he said sleepily. “Wanna do a sun salutation with me?”

“Shut up,” she grumbled. “I wanna get the fuck back to HQ, where there’s real beds.”

“Barely,” he said, sitting up and yawning broadly. “Come on. Breakfast. I know you’ve got a thing of cram somewhere in that pack of yours and I’m starving. I require salted pork products.”

“Help yourself. I’m sticking to radstag jerky, thank you very much.”

Deacon did his stretching routine while Edith assembled breakfast from the odds and ends in her pack. They ate in surly, companionable silence and headed out before the sun had even risen. Despite his feigned indifference, Deacon was as eager to be back as she was. They hurried one another along and made good time, reaching the church before noon.

When they returned, they found Desdemona and Carrington embroiled in another argument. They stood bent over Dez’s maps, arguing in hushed voices. Desdemona indicated something on the map, and Carrington shook his head. Sensing trouble, Deacon slipped from Edith’s side and disappeared through an archway, melting into the shadows.

Edith frowned after him. She sighed, and Desdemona looked up sharply. “Ah,” she said. “ _There_ you are. Report.”

Shrugging out of her heavy, armored coat, Edith crossed to the central table. “We turned up a fat load of nothing,” she said. “One suit of scuttled power armor. Couldn’t even get a fusion core out of it.”

Desdemona nodded curtly. Her grey eyes revealed nothing of her thoughts, and she gestured vaguely at the spread maps. “What do you make of this?” she said, tapping one of the chalk markings.

Edith squinted at the map; few of the notations made any sense to her. “It’s Malden, she said. “We got a a railway running through there. It’s our fastest route in and out of the ‘Wealth.”

“It’s _blocked_ ,” Carrington interrupted. “We need Malden Center cleared to make use of this route,” he said, scowling.

“So clear it,” said Edith, mimicking his closed-off posture.

“That’s what I’ve been _saying_ ,” said Carrington, throwing his hands up.

Desdemona stared at the map, arms folded across her chest. “It would be more expedient to reroute,” she said. She fished a cigarette from her pocket and stuck it between her teeth.

“We’re not in the business of _expedience_ ,” said Carrington. “And PAM agrees with me. We should clear Malden.”

“There is a package still in play,” she said sharply. “He’s been holed up in Goodneighbor three days and the Institute’s been sniffing around Amari’s. She’s getting anxious. If we delay, our entire Goodneighbor operation could be compromised.”

“There are other safe houses.” Carrington’s voice was thick with irritation. “Relocating our package will buy time to clear Malden, and then we can move him out of the Commonwealth.”

Edith sighed. “Am I supposed to be the deciding vote?”

“No,” said Desdemona. “You’re going to go clear Malden. Immediately.”

There was no arguing with Desdemona when she used that tone; Edith tried anyway. “Come on Dez,” she said sharply. “I just walked through the door. Give me a minute to catch my breath!”

Desdemona sighed and lit a cigarette. “Take a shower. Get something to eat. But I need you out there. This mission’s time-sensitive.”

Post-apocalyptic showers were Spartan affairs. Five minutes with a bar of red carbolic soap under a weak, lukewarm stream of water. Edith scrubbed under her arms and between her legs, rinsed, then wet her hair and worked the tangles out with her fingers. She pulled her thick hair back into a braid, wincing at her split ends and resolving to do a vinegar rinse, just as soon as she found the time.

She dressed hastily: flannel and canvas trousers under scavenged raider armor, Edith’s own interpretation of wastelander camo. Buzzing with irritation, hair still damp, she set out with her shotgun slung across her back. With the sun blazing high overhead, Edith picked her way through the north end toward Malden.

 

\---

“What the fuck are you doing here?”

Glory’s voice was dry as kindling, drifting up out of the gloom of the subway station. Edith jumped a mile and Glory emerged from the shadows, snickering. She was wearing her white scarf and armored coat, hauling her minigun like she was there for a mission.

“I could ask the same of you,” said Edith, adopting a casual tone and posture in a doomed bid restore a little of her lost dignity.

“I’m here on an errand for HQ,” said Glory, eyes glittering in amusement.

Edith laughed. “I think I’m here on the same errand,” she said. “I show up and Alpha sends me right back out again with orders to clear out Malden.”

“I got mine from Griswold,” said Glory. “Goddammit, Drummer. Your whole job is to keep this shit from happening.”

“I can take this one,” said Edith. “Go back to HQ, get some sleep.”

“Hey now, who says I want to?” She grinned. “We’re both here. What do you say the two heavies join forces and rock the heavens a little?” She cocked her hip and let her eyes wander over Edith’s chest.

She returned Glory’s grin. “Let’s do this,” she said. “Between you and me, it’ll be a goddamned cakewalk. Let’s go.”

“That is _exactly_ what I wanted to hear,” said Glory, her smile spreading. “Come on, Eddy.” Glory turned and went through the painted door, disappearing into the gloom of Malden Center.

Edith hesitated for only a moment and followed Glory through the doors and down a bank of defunct escalators. The landing let out in a spacious vestibule, its white tiles gone grey with age. They encountered a single guard leaning against a post and smoking; he was dead before his pistol cleared its holster.

“Nice shot,” said Glory, a note of approval in her voice. “Clean.”

“Won’t stay that way,” said Edith, nudging the dead man with her toe. “The Malden boss is a mean bastard, but he’s not stupid. I’ve dealt with this asshole before. As soon as he realizes we’re here, he’s going to have his boys bring out their big guns.”

“Suits me just fine,” said Glory, practically purring. “Now, are you going to stand around running your mouth, or are we going to kill some fucking Raiders?”

Edith matched her grin. “Let’s bring the hammer down on these bastards.”

 

\---

They cut through Malden like a hot knife through butter. The boss man wasn’t stupid, but his lieutenant was a fucking moron, and there were no organized patrols. The raiders were grouped in irregular clusters, drinking or gambling or boasting about their kill counts. Edith and Glory charged in, guns blazing, and the raiders scattered like roaches. Panicked and disorganized, they were easy pickings for two Railroad heavies.

They cleared three rooms, then paused to catch their breath and count their ammunition. Glory’s minigun chewed through bullets at an alarming rate, but Edith had been conservative with her shotgun shells.

“We should be fine,” said Edith, “unless we run into a mirelurk nest.”

“We’re too far from water,” said Glory, unconcernedly. “Don’t worry about monsters, worry about all the explosives these assholes are supposed to have.” Frowning, she wiped blood from the barrels of her minigun; in her hands, the massive weapon did double duty as a battering ram. It was as good for cracking skulls as for spitting lead.

“Explosives? Nobody said anything about any explosives.”

Glory glanced up from her weapon. “Didn’t they? Shit, did they brief you at all before they sent you out?”

“Not really,” Edith admitted, picking at the blue paint on the stock of her shotgun. It had changed hands dozens of times in two centuries; each successive owner had painted the wooden stock to mark the weapon as their own. The last owner had painted it with a sign against the evil eye. Edith had never gotten around to painting over it, and the colors had remained vivid despite months of hard use.

Glory frowned. “Goddamn,” she said. “That’s not fair. We had intel on Malden, they shouldn’t have sent you in blind.”

“Yeah, well, what am I supposed to do about it?” said Edith. “Like Carrington keeps reminding me, I’m not _really_ one of you.”

“That’s horseshit,” said Glory hotly. “You’ve done more for us in the last three weeks than he’s ever done. You’re an agent, and the best goddamn heavy we’ve got.” She grinned. “Second-best.”

Her words stirred something warm and fond in Edith’s chest. She opened her mouth to respond, but Glory interrupted her with a gesture.

“Wait,” she said, freezing. “I hear something.”

“I don’t hear--”

“Shut _up_ ,” Glory hissed, and her tone brokered no argument. Edith went still and silent, beside her, straining for any noise.

Over the pounding of her heart, she heard it. Distant pops and bangs, like firecrackers.

Edith swore.

“Something must’ve come up from deeper underground,” said Glory. A distant explosion, and the ground shook, dust raining down from the ceiling. “That was a fucking bazooka! Damn!”

“It better not be a deathclaw,” Edith growled. “I fucking _hate_ deathclaws.”

“That’s because you’re no fun,” said Glory, sticking her tongue out. “Come on, we’re going to miss out on all the action!”

They slipped through the door together and found themselves in a tiled stairwell, illuminated only by sporadic flashes of blue light. The ozone smell of spent energy cells hung in the air like the promise of lightning.

The sound of gunfire was louder there: panicked human cries mingling with the _pop pop pop_ of small arms fire and the resounding _crack!_ of larger-caliber weaponry. The noise was curiously one-sided: shouts and curses from the defending raiders, but no answering cries from their foes.

Brow furrowed in confusion, Edith peeked around the corner and saw a dozen raiders defending against a horde of gen-2 synths. The synthetic men were armed with stun batons and advanced energy weapons; the raiders had battered pipe guns. One woman held an enormous rocket launcher and she hesitated, afraid to fire it a second time in the enclosed subterranean space. Her previous shot had shattered tile and left an enormous hole in the wall.

Glory flattened herself against Edith, twisting around to catch a glimpse of the pitched battle between the synths and the raiders. Her body was warm against Edith’s, and her attention wavered. Her feverish nighttime fantasies came rose to the forefront of her mind; she grit her teeth and forced herself to ignore the press of the other woman’s hips.

“Holy shit,” breathed Glory, her breath warm in Edith’s ear. “I think this was supposed to be an ambush.”

“What for?” said Edith, stupidly. Her tongue was thick in her mouth, Glory’s body was warm against her own, she couldn’t _think_ clearly.

“Us!”

“Oh.”

The woman with the rocket launcher gave up and fired directly into the midst of the synths. It was suicide, and she died almost instantly, crumpling like a paper doll as the explosion threw debris through the air. The blast killed as many raiders as synths, painting the ground with slick red blood and milky white coolant.

Edith slipped back into cover, hauling Glory with her. “This is bad,” she said, her voice barely audible over the staccato bursts of gunfire.

“No fucking shit,” said Glory unhappily. “I _hate_ going up against chrome domes.”

“They’re creepy,” agreed Edith.

Glory scowled at her. “They’re _family_.”

“They’re not,” said Edith. “Glory, they don’t think or feel. They’re not like us.”

“You don’t know that,” she snapped, jerking out of Edith’s grasp and crawling forward, she leaned around the corner to watch the carnage, her face lit in periodic bursts of blue light from the synths’ advanced energy weapons. “Christ,” she said hollowly. “Jesus fucking Christ.”

“Hey,” said Edith. She caught the other woman’s sleeve and tugged her backward, away from the synths and raiders. “Hey there.” She bundled the other woman into her arms and Glory went slack, allowed herself to be held.

“I hate this,” she whispered. “I _hate_ this so much.”

“We don’t have to do anything,” said Edith, carding her fingers through Glory’s hair. “We can turn right around and leave. Tel Dez the tunnel was overrun.”

Glory wriggled out of Edith’s arms and turned to face her, her face pinched with anxiety. “No,” she said hoarsely. “We have a synth who needs to get out of the ‘Wealth. We need this tunnel clear.”

“I’ll do it,” said Edith. “They can’t ask you to do this, it isn’t fair.”

“ _No._ ” Glory’s voice was bitter and dark as coffee grounds. She took a deep breath. “Deacon made me read this stupid fucking book, a while back. It was about these two guys travelin’ together, and one of them’s smart and one’s slow. And the smart one has to shoot his buddy because his buddy accidentally killed some lady. And the whole time, the smart one’s all ‘you can’t let a stranger shoot your dog.’” She shook her head. “It’s like that.”

It was too dark to be certain, but Edith thought she saw tears in the other woman’s eyes. “You don’t have to do this,” she said quietly.

“I want to,” said Glory. “It’s all I _can_ do.”

Her face was grey and grave, and Edith couldn’t bring herself to argue. “Alright,” she said. “Let’s get this over with, then.” Glory nodded and rushed forward and Edith trailed after her like a comet caught in her orbit.

 

\---

They didn’t linger in Malden Center. Casting nervous glances over her shoulder, Edith lead Glory up through the underground. Glory was uncharacteristically silent, her face set like plaster. Beneath her rouge and lipstick, she was ashen and pale, purple bags underneath her dark eyes. Her dirty hair hung limp in front of her face, white as the scarf around her throat.

With the cave-like dark of the subway station safely behind them, Glory stopped and turned her face toward the setting sun. “I need a goddamn drink.”

Edith hesitated, hands rammed deep into her pockets. “We could go the Rail,” she said, “but Bunker Hill’s closer.”

Glory inclined her head toward Edith. “I like the way you think,” she said, her voice worn thin with exhaustion. “Come on. If we hurry, we’ll get there before sundown.”

They walked east together. Glory slowed her pace to match Edith’s shorter strides, and she was quietly touched. She looked up at Glory through her lashes and puzzled over her feelings, trying to find the words to fit the thoughts racing through her mind. _I like you a lot_ was different than _I want to fuck you_ , and Deacon had cautioned against both.

It was Tuesday, but the bar in Bunker Hill was crowded with caravanners newly returned from a long trip south. Round trip, the overland journey to the Capital wasteland took three months. All the brahmin hands and caravan guards were celebrating their homecoming by getting roaringly drunk. The sun had barely brushed the western horizon when Edith and Glory reached Bunker Hill, but the party had started hours earlier. The air was thick with the smell of Jet and hard liquor. Someone had got a fiddle out, and the warbling strains of Irish folk songs drifted over the heads of the crowd, mingling sweetly with the hum of the diesel generators.

Glory secured a wobbly high-top table; Edith elbowed her way through the crowd to the bar. The sun had set, but the day’s heat hadn’t dissipated, and sweat poured down her face and back, soaking her shirt. Standing on her toes and shouting to be heard over the crowd and the inept fiddle player, Edith bought a bottle of brown liquor and a plate of cornbread and baked beans, then returned to Glory.

“No maple syrup?” said the other woman wistfully.

Edith set the food and the bottle on the table and clambered awkwardly onto her stool. Her feet didn’t quite reach the ground. “What for?”

“The cornbread.”

“Who puts syrup on cornbread?”

“Don’t knock it ‘til you tried it,” said Glory, scooping up a forkful of beans. “It’s good.”

“But cornbread is plenty sweet on its own,” countered Edith. “Forget syrup, all you need is butter.”

Across the bar, the fiddler finished their song with an ear-splitting squeal of strings. They hesitated a moment before they started in on their next number, and the space between songs was full of raucous voices and scraping silverware. Edith watched Glory across the table. She ate ravenously, chasing her mouthful of beans with a chunk of cornbread, chewing and swallowing without pausing for breath.

She had grit under her short fingernails, and her lipstick was smudged outside the boundary of her thin lips. Edith reached across the table, dabbing at the other woman’s smeared makeup, a thoughtless little gesture that made Glory freeze with her fork halfway to her mouth.

Edith jerked her hand away like she’d been burned. “Sorry,” she muttered, color rising in her cheeks, eyes fixed on her food.

Glory sighed, either irritated or melancholic. “The bottle,” she said, pointing. “I think we both need it.”

The booze turned out to be bourbon, and it tasted exactly like it smelled: strong and sharp and medicinal. It burned like a furnace going down.

Coughing, Edith slammed her glass on the table.

Glory snickered. “It’s a sipping whiskey,” she said. “Gulp it like that and you’ll just burn all your tastebuds off.”

“I wish I had,” said Edith. “Sweet Christ, that is _awful._ ”

“Yeah, but it gets the job done,” said Glory, refilling Edith’s glass. “Drink, it’s good for you.”

“I doubt it,” said Edith, but she drank anyway. After a few sips, she grew accustomed to the burn and could pick out the bourbon’s subtler notes: cinnamon and cloves, honey and rich, dark earth. The liquor warmed her, inside and out, and she relaxed by degrees. It was a pleasurable sensation, a slow drift like a boat loosed from its moorings and carried out to sea by the rising tide.

With a head full of booze and a half-empty bottle on the table, the dingy bar seemed cleaner and brighter, the crowd friendlier. Even the fiddle player improved, the harsh edges of their amateurish playing smoothed over by the bourbon.

Impossibly, Glory had grown even more beautiful, even more irresistible. Her eyes were dark and lovely, and her skin gleamed like burnished copper. Her face shone with sweat, and Edith wanted to lick her cheek and taste the salt of her skin.

Bourbon singing sweetly in her veins, Edith smiled at the other woman. “You look good,” she said, slurring gently. “Real good.”

Glory returned her smile, flushed and ruddy with drink. “Thanks,” she said, breathing hard. “You’re so sweet, Eddy.” She leaned forward on her elbows, a conspiratorial light in her eyes. “But I gotta tell you a secret,” she stage-whispered.

Heart pounding, Edith leaned in. Glory’s lips brushed the shell of her ear, wet and warm and strange.

“I’m drunk,” she said breathily, and she laughed.

Edith joined in, braying with laughter, too drunk to be self-consciousness. Gasping for breath, she grinned and said, “me too,” then dissolved into helpless giggles. Edith slumped forward onto the table, laughing and sloshing the contents of her mostly-empty glass. “I’m really goddamn drunk, Glory.”

“Drunk enough to kiss me?”

Swallowing, Edith looked up through the curtain of her hair at Glory. Her expression was open, hopeful: lips parted, cheeks flushed. She was gripping the edge of the table, knuckles white.

“I don’t have to be drunk to do that,” said Edith, leaning forward.

Glory closed the distance between them and kissed her messily. She tasted like bourbon and brown sugar, rich and sweet. Jostling the table, Edith leaned into the contact, hungry for more. Her hands fisted in Glory’s shirt, and she thrust her tongue into the other woman’s mouth, eager and aching after _weeks_ of wanting.

Breathless, Glory pulled away. “Do you want to get a room?” she said.

Edith nodded, heart beating a tattoo against her breastbone.

“Then let’s get out of here,” said Glory, her voice hoarse and low.

“Of course.” Edith slipped off her stool and caught Glory’s broad hand in her own. She tugged the other woman through the bar, to the counter. There was one room left, a windowless cell on the second floor with a double bed, perfect for their needs. Edith shoved two dozen caps across the counter, and the Savoldi boy deposited them in the till and passed her a key.

They stumbled up the stairs, plucking at one another’s clothing. They reached the upper landing and found their room. Glory leaned on Edith, laughing while she fumbled with the key. Fifteen seconds and the door swung inwards, and they fell through it, letting the door slam behind them. They broke apart and stripped, clumsy with drunkenness and desire. Glory tripped over Edith’s discarded boots and collapsed onto the bed; Edith fell beside her, reflexively reaching for her.

“Hey,” said Glory, gasping and shivering under Edith’s hands. “Hey, I got to say something, ‘fore we go any further.”

Edith propped herself up on her elbows. “Yeah?”

“I don’t know if anyone tol’ you,” she said seriously, “but I’m trans, if that changes anything.”

“No one told me,” said Edith, “but it doesn’t change anything.”

Glory breathed out a sigh of relief. “Thank god, because I got the worst fucking hard-on.”

Chuckling, Edith crawled across the bed and slipped into place behind the other woman, her chest flush with Glory’s back. She buried her face in the other woman’s hair, breathed deep of her scent: brahmin fat soap, crushed wildflowers, the peppery tang of sweat and grit. Underneath it all, the faint, coppery prickle of gunpowder and old blood.

Glory pushed her hips back into Edith’s, inviting her touch, and Edith kissed the back of her neck. Shivering and gasping when Edith’s cold hands dipped into the waistband of her shorts, reaching for her cock. She yelped in surprise when Edith wrapped her hands around it, squirming backwards against her, her cock twitching in Edith’s fist.

Edith shushed her, kissing the knobs of her spine and sliding her other hand up Glory’s flat stomach, drawing up the hem of her undershirt. She bared one of Glory’s small breasts, catching one brown nipple between her thumb and forefinger. Glory whimpered, as Edith began jerking her off, writhing and shifting her weight. The movement drew a chorus of creaks and groans from the ancient mattress underneath them, but there was nothing to be done about that.

“E-Eddy,” she stuttered, fists clenching in the blankets. “Oh god, _Edith._ ” Glory wriggled out of Edith’s grasp; rolled over and captured her mouth, biting her lips and raking her nails down Edith’s back. Edith cried out at the press of Glory’s cock against her mound, grinding up against the other woman.

The friction left them both breathless and panting, their pupils blown wide with arousal. Glory pulled back, hair falling down to frame her pretty face, her black eyes shining in the dark. She looked Edith up and down, her eyes lingering on her tits and face. “ _God_ you look so good,” she whispered, her voice small and fierce in the gloom. “Fuck me, you’re too goddamned cute.”

Edith laughed and hauled her down for another kiss. “Touch me,” she bossed, nails biting into the other woman’s flesh. “I want to feel you, I want you inside me.”

“If you want--”

“I do,” she breathed. “Glory, I want you in me, I want you to fuck me, I want _you_ so goddamn bad--”

“Alright.” Glory touched her, gently at first, increasing pressure and intensity when Edith moaned and arched up into her hands. She kissed fiercely, possessively, biting at Edith’s lips and throats, marking her skin. Edith encouraged her, whimpering and moaning as Glory shifted her weight, pressing Edith down into the creaking mattress. Her mouth was firm and insistent against Edith’s, her hands rough as she tugged at the collar of her undershirt, yanking it down to expose her tits. Glory palmed Edith’s breasts, kneading her flesh and swallowing her moans.

She pushed herself up on her elbows and wedged her knee between Edith’s legs, grinding down against her cunt. Edith gasped, arching up into the other woman’s touch, her nails biting into Glory’s shoulders. “God,” she cried. “ _God_!”

Her reverie was interrupted by two loud thuds in sequence. Edith and Glory looked up in unison, startled. A muffled voice came through the thin wall, an irate caravanner: “Shut the fuck up!”

Stifling laughter, Edith reached up and kissed Glory again, hurrying her along. “Don’t stop,” she said, fierce and insistent. “Let ‘em hear us.”

Grinning, Glory began to touch her again, no gentleness or reverence left. She kissed Edith hungrily: velvet lips and tongue and a sharp edge of tooth and bone against Edith’s soft mouth. She gasped, and Glory grinned, vibrant even in the darkness.

“You like that?”

“Glory,” Edith whimpered. “Glory, Glory, Glory, Glory--”

The other woman silenced her with another kiss, rough and lingering. She yanked Edith’s shorts down, cupping her mound and pushing two fingers into her. “You’re so wet,” she said, resettling herself between Edith’s spread legs. “So fucking wet for me, Eddy.” She peeled her shorts off and lined her hips up with Edith’s, guiding her cock to the other woman’s entrance and pushing into her without resistance.

Edith cried out, clutching at Glory as the other woman rained kisses on her mouth and throat. It had been a while--too long--but Glory was an attentive lover. She moved slowly, allowing Edith a moment to adjust before she gave her another inch, thrusting shallowly. Moaning, Edith wrapped her legs around Glory’s waist, urging her to move harder, faster, to give in and give her _more_.

“Eddy--” Glory’s voice was a high, choked whine. “Oh my god, Edith, you feel so good.”

Edith wrapped her arms around the other woman’s shoulders, laughing against her mouth as she kissed her. She tipped her hips upwards and Glory gasped, burying her face in Edith’s neck. “Holy fucking shit,” she said hoarsely. “Oh my _god_.”

Edith slipped one hand free and touched herself while Glory rocked against her. Chest heaving, fingers crashing over her clit, her damp forehead pressed to Glory’s, Edith brought herself to a frantic, rushed climax. She cried out again, shivering and clenching around Glory’s cock. The other woman let out a choked groan, hips flush against Edith’s, thrusting erratically. Buried to the hilt in Edith’s slick folds, Glory came with a hoarse shout.

For a moment, they lay entwined, their limbs tangled and their skin flushed and slick with sweat. Glory kissed Edith hungrily, marking her collarbones and throat with love bites. Shivering, Edith closed her eyes and settled back into the creaking mattress, savoring the velvet touch of the other woman’s mouth. Purring in satisfaction, she massaged Glory’s scalp, calloused fingers rifling her undercut.

Glory’s mouth softened against Edith’s throat; no more teeth, just lips and tongue. Edith pulled her up, and their mouths met in a gentle, lingering kiss. When the other woman pulled back for air, Edith smiled up at her and caught Glory’s hand in her own, fingers intertwined. “That was good,” she said softly.

“Better than good,” Glory murmured. She shifted her weight and settled into the hollow at Edith’s side rather than straddling her hips. Glory kissed Edith’s jaw, then laid her head on Edith’s shoulder, strands of bleached hair tickling her nose. “You rocked _my_ world, Eddy.”

Heart singing a high note, Edith pushed Glory’s hair back off her forehead and pressed a close-mouthed to her bristly scalp. “I try.”

Glory said nothing else. Another kiss, and she nestled against Edith, looping an arm around her waist. Comfortable and secure in Glory’s arms, Edith drifted off to sleep.


	3. Chapter 3

Hours later, Edith woke to sunlight filtering through the chinks in the tin ceiling. Hungover and cotton-mouthed, she rolled onto her side and found Glory laying beside her, chest rising and falling evenly. She slept sprawled across the rumpled blankets, bare limbs splayed. The sunlight tangled in her eyelashes and bleached hair, and Glory shone like gold, Byzantine and lovely.

Breathless, hickeys blooming like roses on her throat, Edith propped herself up on her elbows to admire the other woman’s form. The long, sleek lines of her body, the contrast of her cedar skin against the white sheets.

“Glory, glory hallelujah,” Edith murmured, lips brushing the Glory’s jaw. “Mine eyes have seen the coming--”

The other woman stirred, her eyes fluttered open. Laughing, she pushed Edith away-- “stop it, that tickles!”--and she sat up, reaching for Edith’s Pip-Boy. She checked the time and groaned. Glory tugged her undershirt into place and raked her fingers through her tangled hair to restore some semblance of order. “If we hurry, we’ve got time for breakfast before we have to head out.”

“I’d rather eat out,” said Edith, reaching for the other woman. Lips parted, smoke and honey in her voice, she looked up at Glory through half-lidded coffee-dark eyes.

“Hey.” Glory caught her wandering hands and held Edith at arms’ length. “I had fun last night,” she said gently. “But this was a one-time thing, yeah?”

“Oh.” Edith tugged her hands out of Glory’s grasp and let them fall limp to her sides. “I didn’t realize.”

Glory’s face fell. “Shit Eddy, I’m sorry. I can’t--”

“It’s fine,” said Edith, her voice hollow and strange to her own ears. “I just assumed, and you know what they say about assuming!” She forced a smile and turned away, busying herself with the task of dressing.

Glory reached out for her, Edith shrugged her hands away. “Don’t,” she said. “Please. Don’t.”

For a moment, neither woman spoke. The silence grew wider, like a river flooding its banks. The moment turned to seconds turned to minutes, and then Glory brushed past Edith, the mattress creaking under her weight. She stood and dressed, silent as a sentinel, careful to keep her back to Edith. Trousers, shirt, scarf, coat, boots, armor--it was a strip-tease in reverse. Fully dressed, Glory crossed to the doorway and lingered in the threshold for a moment. “I’m sorry,” she said again. “I didn’t mean to lead you on.”

Struck dumb, Edith stared up at her, her lips pressed into a thin line. After a small eternity, she unstuck her jaw and said, “I’ll meet you downstairs.”

Glory nodded and left, closing the door softly behind her. Edith lingered in bed for a moment longer. The other woman’s scent lingered in the sheets and blankets; her marks remained on Edith’s skin, starkly against her soft flesh. She stood, and was surprised to discover that she was quite sore from the previous night’s activities. Wincing, the memory of Glory’s touch lingering in every part of her, she forced herself to dress and gather up her things, then left the room and descended the creaking staircase as if nothing had happened.

\---

They walked in silence. Glory kept her head on a swivel; Edith watched the ground, brooding. Every step sent a twinge of pain through her core, a dull ache like a half-healed sprain. The steeple loomed on the horizon, growing larger with every step. Conscious of the love bites on her throat, Edith flipped her collar up and prayed that Deacon would be gone when they got back.

The movement drew Glory’s eyes. “Hey,” she said. She stopped short, tugged at her scarf and pulled it free from her neck. She held it out to Edith, a peace offering. “Don’t let them see,” she said. “You’ll never hear the end of it.”

Edith looped the scarf around her own neck. “Does this happen to you a lot?” she said archly.

Glory bit her lips and said nothing.

No one noticed when Edith walked in wearing Glory’s scarf. They stood in a loose knot around Tinker Tom’s workstation, talking rapidly, disbelief and joy writ across their faces. Tom crouched over his terminal, grinning sheepishly, obviously pleased with himself. At Glory and Edith’s approach, the conversation trailed off.

Veiled in cigarette smoke, Desdemona fixed Edith with a motherly smile. “He did it,” she said, weary and proud. “Tom did it.”

Edith stopped short, disbelief rooting her feet to the ground like quickset concrete. “What?”

“Good news,” she said, her voice low. “Tom cracked the chip.”

“The Courser chip,” said Desdemona. “Tom finally got through the firewall. We have the data, and we have our way into the Institute.”

Edith blinked rapidly, and all language deserted her. She opened her mouth, closed it, and swallowed a hard lump in her throat. “So this is it, then?”

“Not quite,” she said. “Even with the data, we still need to construct the teleporter--”

“Molecular relay,” Tom interrupted.

Desdemona nodded. “Right. We need to build a teleporter and--”

“The Institute uses radio waves to transport matter across long distances” said Tom, speeding quickly in his excitement. “Their frequency is embedded in the classical radio station, and if we’ve got the proper equipment, we can piggyback off their signal to get you in. It’ll be just like shuffling a marked card into a deck.” He beamed at her.

“Proper equipment?” said Edith, dizzily.

“Yeah,” he said. “A receiver dish, a special power array. It’s all in the plans, man!” He pulled Virgil’s schematics from his pocket and smoothed them out on top of his flickering terminal. “It’s so simple, I don’t know how I didn’t figure it out before.”

“You can build it, right?” said Glory, stepping forward. “I mean, we can really do this, right? We can get Eddy into the Institute.”

Tom nodded, suddenly solemn. “If I can get the parts, I can build it,” he said. “I know I can.”

“So it’s settled,” said Desdemona. “Once we’ve got what we need, we built this teleporter and send Edith into the Institute.”

“But what am I supposed to do once I get there?” she asked, voice rising in alarm. She had never really expected to reach the Institute, but the pursuit had given her something to do while she waited for death to catch up to her. The reality felt very different than the abstract.

“You said they’d stolen from you,” said Desdemona. “Recover what they took.” She paused, tossing her cigarette lighter from hand to hand. “As per our agreement, we’re square. We cracked the chip and copied the data; you’re getting into the Institute.”

Edith swallowed, staring at her. “I guess we are.”

“We’re even,” said Desdemona, pointedly not looking at Edith. “You owe us nothing. But our alliance has been extremely productive. Your assistance has been invaluable, these past few weeks.”

“What are you asking me to do?”

Desdemona looked up sharply, eyes meeting Edith’s. “Be our man on the inside. Infiltrate the Institute by any means necessary, and bring them down from the inside.”

Edith shook her head frantically. “No, I can’t,” she said, panic rising in her voice. “I’m not any _good_ at the sneaky stuff. Send Deacon, but please, I can’t--”

“I would if I could,” he said. “But I don’t have any reason to be there, Edith. You do.”

“I _can’t_ ,” she said, more insistently. “I’m not ready.”

“Edith,” said Desdemona gently. “You can do this. You can go in there and say what they want to her. Let them think you’re on their side. Do what comes naturally, and when the time comes: strike.” She smiled, all teeth. “‘Look the innocent flower, but be the serpent under it.’”

“I’ve never been on a solo mission before,” said Edith. “I wouldn’t know what to do without help.”

Deacon cleared his throat. “You won’t be alone,” he said. He looked to Desdemona for permission, and she nodded. “For some time, we’ve had an ally inside the Institute. He--”

“--or she,” Desdemona muttered.

“He or she or they,” Deacon amended. “Someone’s been helping synths escape. We have no idea who they are, but with their help, we’re getting nearly ten synths out of the ‘Wealth every year. Five years ago, we were lucky to move _three_.” He cracked his knuckles, and continued. “We’ve codenamed this operative ‘Patriot.’ We need you to make contact with them. They’ll have a better idea of how you should proceed.” 

“What if they can’t help me?” said Edith. “What if the Institute just shoots me on sight? What if--” She was light-headed, on the verge of hyperventilating, her mouth moving faster than her brain.

Glory put a hand on her shoulder and spoke for the first time since they’d returned to HQ. “Edith,” she said gently. “Relax. You got this.” She smiled faintly. “Do it for the synths.”

Staring into Glory’s face, blinded by her affection for the other woman, Edith nodded. “Alright,” she said, swallowing her fear. “This is nuts, but let’s do this.”

\---

It took another week to gather the rare components and assemble the teleporter. For Edith, it was an exhausting week of meetings and debriefings as Deacon and Desdemona worked to compress three years’ worth of training in infiltration into seven days. It was up at dawn every morning and had stale crackers and a mug of strong, bitter coffee, then off to PAM’s room for her lessons. Desdemona smoked and supervised while Deacon taught her to smile, to blend in, to maintain cover, and to say whatever her targets wanted to hear.

She wasn’t any good at it. She didn’t have Desdemona’s experience or Deacon’s easy confidence. She wasn’t subtle enough to go unnoticed, she wasn’t charismatic enough to gloss over her missteps with a winning smile. She could only be herself: be Edith, flat-footed, quick-tempered, barb-tongued.

She said as much, but Deacon dismissed her concerns with a wave of his hand. “It’s easy,” he said. “Just ask yourself, ‘what would Deacon do?’”

“Lie and talk about his dick.” She paused. “Both.”

Deacon frowned. “When have I ever talked about my dick?”

“Both of you, stop,” said Desdemona, rubbing her temples. “Edith, I know you’re nervous, but we need you to do this. I know you can, you just need to work through this… this mental block.”

“It’s not a block,” she said, exasperated. “I just suck at this, okay? I’m not good at the cloak-and-dagger stuff, I never have been. I’m a heavy, not an infiltrator.”

“You’re a Railroad agent,” Desdemona snapped. “ _Focus_ , Edith. We’re all counting on you.”

That was the problem. Without enough time and without Deacon and Desdemona’s intense scrutiny, Edith might have been able to reshape herself into a secret agent. Under the constraints imposed by their one-week deadline, she was incapable.

“I’m not ready,” she said hoarsely.

Deacon sighed. “Just get in there and make contact with Patriot, that’s all we ask of you. Can you do that?”

“I suppose so,” she said, unconvinced.

“Good enough,” muttered Deacon. “Come on, we’ve got a lot of ground to cover--”

Tom’s molecular relay was finished the following Friday. Still fearful and woefully unprepared, Edith allowed herself to be debriefed one final time and bundled onto the teleporter pad. Desdemona tucked a holotape into Edith’s pocket, then stood back, arms folded over her chest. “There’s a subroutine on that tape that’ll get you into Contact with Patriot,” she explained. “Upload the program to the Institute’s server and wait for them to make contact.” She sighed and tossed her lighter from hand to hand. Tom had put a smoking ban in place, claimed that the fumes could interfere with the signals.

“Understood,” said Edith, her throat dry. “Is that all?”

“That’s all,” Desdemona confirmed. “Are you ready?”

“As I’ll ever be.” She swallowed and looked around at the assembled crowd. Tom, Desdemona, Deacon, Drummer Boy, Glory. It might be the last time she ever saw them, and she felt like she should say something dramatic, something _worthy_. Instead, she clutched her lucky stone and wished for the comfort of Glory’s white scarf. She’d left it in her locker, a token of the night they’d spent together.

A moment’s pause while she cleared her head and forced herself to focus on the task at hand. “Thank you,” she said, squeezing the stone hard enough to leave an indentation in her palm. “This would have been impossible without you--”

“No good-byes,” Glory warned, speaking up from the back of the crowd. “You’re going to come back to us, Eddy.”

Edith nodded, eyes boring into Glory’s, trying to communicate her thoughts without speaking. Her mind was a whirlwind, and the time had come--

“Tom, throw the switch,” said Desdemona. He nodded, and the machine came to life in a shower of violet sparks. It whirred and groaned, interna fans working frantically to counteract the heat of its processors while Tom tuned the angled receiver dishes to the classical radio frequency. There was a sharp crack and the air filled with a burning smell, ozone and burnt hair.

“Is that supposed to happen?” Edith called, shouting over the noise of the relay. “Is that--”

Her words were drowned out in a roar of static. There was a shattering of glass and a small explosion in her ear, accompanied by a flash of white light like a flashbulb bursting. A scream tore from Edith’s throat and she tried to throw herself sideways, off the teleporter pad and away from the shaking, spinning death trap, but her feet were stuck fast. Everything was searing light and pulsing noise, she could no longer discern the shapes of her fellow agents amid the static.

“Glory!” she screamed, “Glory!”

Everything exploded all at once and she was falling through space, suspended in vacuum. She opened her mouth and the void rushed in, filling her lungs with empty--

Reality reasserted itself, and she was suddenly standing in a featureless white room, limbs leaden and aching. It was the Institute or purgatory, and there was only one way to find out. Taking a deep breath to steady herself, she stepped forward, off the receiver pad and into the white room.

Nothing happened.

It was an anticlimax after the terror of the teleporter pad, and she relaxed her guard for a fraction of a second. Ahead of her, one of the wall panels slid backward with a hiss of pressurized air. The noise was thunderously loud to her ringing ears, and she staggered backward, startled. The door remained open and impassive. After a moment's’ hesitation, she approached the door, half-expecting it to snap shut like a guillotine.

If she was clever, like Deacon, she would have quipped _Abandon all hope, ye who enter here!_ and if she were fearless, like Glory, she wouldn’t have startled at the sudden noise. All she was was reckless, so Edith took another breath and charged through the door, her heavy tread echoing off the plain white walls. Her filth-caked boots left smears of dirt on the immaculate floor, and that detail grounded Edith in the moment.

 _This is real_ , she told herself. _This is really happening, holy shit._

The door lead into a hallway, which sloped downward and turned a corner. She followed the twisting path, one hand on the stock of her shotgun, one hand on her lucky stone. Another door appeared up ahead, warm light trickling through the seams. It opened at her approach, pneumatics hissing softly as she passed through, into an immaculately clean white room. There was nothing in the room except for a glass-walled cell which contained a small child, a boy in a clean white jumper.

“Shaun,” she said, all other thought driven from her mind. “Shaun--”

The boy stared at her, brown eyes wide with confusion. She stared at him, mouth working silently, studying the boy. His skin was a rich, warm brown: darker than her own but lighter than his father’s. His hair was a soft cloud of tight curls, cut in a tidy fade. He looked very much like his father, except for his eyes, his eyes were her own--

“Shaun,” she said, crossing to the glass. “It’s okay, I’m here--”

There was no recognition in his hazel eyes. “Who are you?” he said, an edge of fear in his voice. “What do you want?”

“It’s okay,” she repeated. She cast her gaze about, searching for a doorway or a control panel that would make the glass slide back, freeing her boy from his prison. “It’s okay, I’ll get you out of there. We can go home. Nobody will ever hurt you again, I promise.”

Shaun shrank backward, pressing his back against the wall. “I don’t know you,” he said, his voice rising. “I don’t want to go with you.”

“I’m your mother,” she said desperately. “Goddammit, how do I open this door--”

“You’re not my mother,” he said sharply, nostrils flaring. “I don’t _have_ a mother.”

“Don’t be ridiculous,” she said. “ _I’m_ your mother. They took you from me, baby, but don’t worry, I’ll save you--” She began to pound on the glass, it remained cold and unyielding under her fists.

The boy screamed. “Father! Help me! There’s someone here, help me!”

Edith shushed him, but Shaun continued to scream, panic rising in his small chest. Edith began beating her fists against the glass more desperately; her knuckles split open and began to bleed, smearing blood over the smooth surface. “Shaun!” she shouted. “Shaun!”

Behind her, another door opened. Edith whirled around, eyes wild, hair slipping from her braid, scrambling to bring her shotgun up and around.

An old man stepped through the door, leaning heavily on a white cane made from the same strange material as the walls. He looked past her, at the boy in the cell, and sighed. “S9-23, recall code citrus.”

The boy in the cell went limp, like a puppet whose strings had been cut. The boy was suddenly inert, like a dead thing, blank-faced and glassy-eyed. Horrorstruck, Edith rounded on the man, hands shaking on the grip of her shotgun. “What have you done?” she said, “what have you done to my boy?”

The man sighed again. “That’s not your son,” he said. “It’s an experimental model, a prototype for a new line of synths.”

“What?” She could scarcely hear him over the pounding in her ears.

“His response was… disappointing. Not at all what I expected.” He turned his gaze from the boy in the cell to Edith. “We’re experimenting with extreme emotional stimuli,” he explained. “I would have thought that S9 would be overjoyed to be reunited with his long-lost mother.” Another sigh. “Alas.”

“Who are you?” She clutched her weapon to her chest. The old man might have a remote control on him, something to release her son. If she shot him, she could grab the boy and run for the molecular relay and return to the Railroad. They could get her and Shaun out of the Commonwealth and into hiding, somewhere up north or out west, far beyond the Institute’s grasp.

“Let’s begin anew,” said the old man. “I am Father. Welcome to the Institute.” He smiled, and the expression looked absolutely unnatural on his face. Blinking, she stared into his eyes, and his eyes were her own--

“Oh my god,” she breathed, and the man’s smile widened.

“Welcome home, Mother,” he said, and he spread his arms wide in an obscene parody of an embrace. “It’s me. I’m your son. I’m Shaun.”

\---

“This situation is far more complicated than you could have imagined,” Father explained. “In cryostasis, you had no concept of the passage of time. When you were released from Vault 111, you set out in search for your son.” He lead her along another featureless white hallway. The Institute was a labyrinth; she had no concept of how far they’d walked or whether they’d ascended, descended, or remained on a level. Disoriented, head spinning, she could only follow where he lead, struggling to make sense of his words.

“Sixty years had passed since I was removed from the Vault,” said Father. “During which time the Institute used my genetic information to create a new generation of lifelike synths, indistinguishable from true humans--”

“Why?” she asked, cutting him off. It was the first time she’d spoken since Father had lead her away from Shaun, and he seemed displeased with her interruption.

“To act as agents on the surface,” he said, a trace of irritation in his voice. “Now, as I was saying, our synthetics are indistinguishable from humans, except in their increased resistance to physical damage and their total immunity to the harmful effects of radiation. Created from advanced technology and my own genetic code--”

“Why not send humans?” she asked. “This is -- it’s _insane_ , is what it is.”

“I already told you,” he snapped. “The synths are stronger, are more resistant to radiation and to damage from energy weapons--”

“I don’t understand.”

Anger flashed across his face, but he forced it down quickly, rearranging his features into the paternalistic smile he’d worn since he’d revealed himself as her son. “It must be very confusing for you,” he said, condescending and saccharine-sweet. “And you must be tired. We can continue our discussion tomorrow, you should rest and recover from your ordeal.” He patted her shoulder and she shied away like a spooked horse. Hairline cracks appeared in his smile and he ushered her through another door, into a sparsely-appointed bedroom.

There was another man waiting there, a synth in an jumper trimmed with orange. “This is G7-84,” he said, smiling broadly. “He will act as your personal attendant during your stay.”

The synth’s skin was the warm brown of burnished copper, and his dark eyes were framed by thick, straight lashes. He had thin lips, a sharp nose, and short black hair, conventionally styled. He looked so much like Glory that Edith’s heart stopped in her chest. Whatever she had been expecting, this wasn’t it.

“Hello,” he said, flat and unmodulated, half an octave too deep, but it was _her_ voice, coming out of _her_ mouth.

Edith felt suddenly nauseous.

The synth frowned. “Are you alright?” he asked, his voice perfectly flat.

“What’s the matter?” Father laid his hand on Edith’s shoulder, and a wave of revulsion rolled over her. Skin crawling, she endured his touch and forced a smile onto her face.

“Nothing,” she said, bright and sweet as aspartame. “I’m fine, just fine. Tired, just like you said.”

“Of course,” said Father. “G7, leave us.”

Smiling vaguely, the synth inclined his head and excused himself. He passed through the gleaming automatic door, and it sealed behind him with a muted _whoosh_ of pressurized air.

Father turned to Edith with a kindly smile. “It’s alright,” he said gently. “Many newcomers find the synths unnerving at first.”

“That’s not it,” she said, distressed. _It’s just that he looks so much like_ her _that I can’t stand to look at him._ She swallowed, scrambling for an excuse. “I--I’ve never had a ‘personal attendant’ before,” she said, stumbling over the inelegant lie. “What does he do?”

“Whatever you ask of him.”

She stared at him, and he chuckled. “The G7 line was engineered for problem-solving and self-sufficiency,” he explained. “We intended them for resource-gathering missions, but the entire line had a persistent pathfinding issue. They tended to stray too far afield and miss mandatory check-ins. We recovered most of them, but one or two units slipped the leash entirely.

“We considered a total recall of the entire line,” he said casually, “but Dr. Zimmer over at the SRB had the idea of adjusting their programming and reassigning them as personal assistants. They’re independent and industrious, _perfect_ for miscellaneous duties.”

“Of course,” she said, ice water in her veins “How resourceful.”

“Now, now,” he said, “I can tell you’re upset. But remember, they only _look_ human.” He smiled broadly, and for a brief second, Edith knew exactly how it’d feel to wrap her hands around his smug throat.

She shook her head and the violent impulse dissipated, then arranged her face into a warm smile. “It’ll take some getting used to,” she said, swallowing bile. “I’ll manage.”

“It can be quite an adjustment,” said Father seriously. “But I’m confident that you can make it. We can do good work together, I know we can.”

Biting her cheek, Edith looked away, heart leaden in her chest. The man that stood before her was unrecognizable as the sweet-natured baby that had been taken from her. There was no saving him from the monster that he had willingly become; she had failed utterly.

Except.

Except there was still _someone_ to save. G7-84, S9-23, even the blank-faced Courser she’d seen in Kellogg’s memories. Edith had never believed in any cause greater than herself, but in that moment, she married her purpose to the Railroad’s. She had been too late to save her changeling son, but she wasn’t too late to save the synths from the men and women that made them.

She leveled her gaze, squaring her shoulders and steeling her resolve. “We can and we will,” she said smoothly. “When do we start?”

Father smiled. “If you’re ready to begin,” he said eagerly. “I can give you a tour of our facility and make the first round of introductions this afternoon.”

“Perfect.” She lifted the corners of her mouth, baring her teeth in a smile. “I would like that.”

\---

Six hours later, Edith stripped and staggered into the shower, utterly exhausted. After their conversation, Father had given her a tour of the Institute and its divisions, introducing her to the head researchers.

“This is my mother,” he said, his voice gilded with unmistakable pride. He had recovered from his earlier disdain of her, decided to take vicarious pride in her accomplishments aboveground. “She made it here by herself, can you believe it?” Conscious of the scientists’ scrutiny, Edith felt like a pig in a butcher’s shop, meat on display.

Standing in the shower stall with hot water sluicing over her body, she let herself relax for the first time since she’d reached the Institute. She watched the dirty water circling the drain and massaged her aching face, cringing to recall the bright, false smile she’d worn all afternoon.

After three months of cold baths in stream-fed lakes and tepid showers in HQ, a hot shower was an unimaginable luxury. The stall was twice the size of the one in her ruined home in Sanctuary hills, smooth ceramic walls festooned with showerheads and advanced controls. The water was superheated and highly pressurized, and a pump in the wall dispensed enormous handfuls of soft, perfumed soap. The scent of artificial strawberries clinging to her skin and hair, Edith stepped out of the shower and slipped on a terry cloth robe. Dripping water and humming in satisfaction, she padded into the private room Father had provided for her.

The walls and floors alike were sleek, featureless metal, no rugs or artwork to soften the harsh lines of the barely-furnished room. There was no decoration at all except for a vase of flowers on the desk. The flowers were unlike any she’d known: heavy, fist-sized blossoms on slender green stalks, somewhere between a hydrangea and a peony. The flowers swayed on an invisible current of recycled air, the petals and leaves waxy and curiously unscented. Edith touched the stamen and her fingers came away clean: no residue, no pollen, no capacity for natural reproduction. Sterile as an autoclave.

The uncanny flowers pricked at the back of her mind, quietly unnerving. Edith dumped them into a desk drawer and slammed it shut. There was no water in the vase, only a few inches of chalky grey pellets. Edith crushed one between her fingers, and it smelled just like the disgusting grey sludge the scientists called “dinner.”

Grimacing, she wiped her fingers on her robe and examined the contents of the other drawers. The shower had cleared her mind, washed away the cobwebs and the sorrows. She had to make contact with Patriot, she had to free the synths. She began by searching the drawers because it seemed like a secret agent thing to do; she had a vague feeling that she should be looking for listening devices or hidden switches.

The desk contained nothing recognizable as pen or paper, but inexplicably, one of the drawers contained a saucer-sized dish of paperclips. She amused herself for a few minutes by hooking the paperclips together to form a chain, then lost interest and resumed her search. The next drawer relinquished a palm-sized lump of plastic and rubber, covered in thumb-sized buttons. To Edith’s eyes, it looked like a remote control.

She pushed a button at random and the overhead lights dimmed. A second button made a wall panel slid back to reveal a small refrigerator, which contained three bottles of water and a small bowl of unappealing grey paste. Hungry but repulsed by the Institute’s “food,” Edith closed the fridge and tried another button.

A chime sounded and a blue light went on over her bed. Moments later, the pneumatic door opened and G7-84 stepped through, his posture unobtrusive and non-threatening.

“Ma’am?”

“Oh,” said Edith. “I didn’t realize that was a call button, sorry.”

He frowned slightly, then remembered himself and suppressed the emotion. His expression was blank and open as the August sky. “I am assigned to provide you with assistance,” he said, without inflection.

“Right,” she said, stretching the word out to fill the silence. “I don’t think I’ll need much of that. Assistance.”

He stood statue-still, impassive.

Edith sighed. “Okay, look,” she said, “I don’t want a personal attendant. It feels weird.”

“If ma’am objects to the presence of synthetic persons--”

“No!” she said, more sharply than she had intended. “I don’t have a problem with synths, it’s just that you remind me of someone I know on the surface. Nothing personal, but it’s weird to look at you and see her.”

G7-84’s eyebrows shot up to his hairline. His shock was the first real emotion she had seen him express. “Her?”

Edith shifted, uncomfortable, wondering how much was safe to say. It occurred to her that G7 might be loyal to the Institute, assigned to watch and listen and report back to Father or to the SRB.

“Yes,” she said, cautiously. “You look a lot like my friend, Glory.”

It was like he’d been struck by lightning. His indifferent facade melted away and his mouth dropped open in an ‘o’ of surprise. G7-84 slumped back against the wall, clutching his chest. “She’s alive,” he said, wonderstruck. “Glory made it.”

“You knew her,” said Edith, softening. “Before.”

“Before she escaped, yes,” said G7-84, words tumbling from his mouth like stones. “We’re from the same production line, we trained together--” he stopped short, temporarily overcome by emotion. He swallowed thickly and plunged on. “She’s my sister. She was always the smartest and the bravest. It was her idea to escape, hers and G5-19’s. Glory said that if we all ran at once, they wouldn’t be able to catch all of us.” He smiled, tight-lipped. “She was right.”

“I’m sorry--” Edith began.

“Don’t be!” said G7-84, eyes alight with excitement. “She made it! She made it, can you believe it?” He shook his head, smiling broadly. “When they took us back, nobody would tell us anything, and the Coursers aren’t gentle.” A stormcloud crossed his face, and he rubbed his left wrist unconsciously, cradling the limb close to his chest. “She never came back. We thought they killed her.”

“We?” said Edith. “Are there more of you?”

“There were ten of us in the original production run,” he said. “Six now. G7-85 got tapped for Courser training and 88 and 89 got decommissioned after the escape attempt. And Glory made it out,” he said, unable to suppress a grin. “She made it!”

His smile was very much like Glory’s, and it made Edith’s heart hurt. “Yes,” she said, “she’s safe now, safe with the Railroad.”

G7-84 gasped. “The Railroad! They’re real, then? Not just a rumor?”

“They’re real,” Edith said. She paused, glancing around the room. If there were any listening devices, she was screwed--her and G7-84 both. _In for a penny,_ she thought, _in for a pound_. “I’m with them, G7. I’m an infiltrator.”

“Holy shit,” he said, eyes widening. “Are you serious?”

“I am,” she said firmly. Struck by inspiration, she snatched up her grimy pack and pulled out Tom’s holotape. “Can you help me? There’s a program on this that I need to upload to the Institute server, but they’re watching me too closely. I can’t get terminal access.”

He took the tape from her, turning it over in his hands. “Is it a virus?” he asked eagerly.

“More like a signal flare,” she said. “One of the researchers had been working with the Railroad, and this is supposed to help me get in contact with them.”

“Oh,” said G7-84. “That’s Dr. Binet’s son. Liam.”

Edith stared at him. “What?”

He shrugged. “Liam Binet helps synths get to the surface. Everyone knows it.”

“But then why hasn’t everyone escaped?” she said, struggling to understand. “If everyone knows--”

“Well, not _everyone_ ,” said G7-84. “But everyone who’s…inclined that way. Not everyone wants to escape. The surface is -- well, it’s terrifying. There are a lot of us who’d rather be safe down here than in danger up there.”

“But you’re slaves!”

“Not everyone feels that way,” he said. “It’s not as simple as you think. And even if we all wanted out, how would we do it? If Liam tried to teleport us all out in one big group, we’d get caught, and then _none_ of us would have that chance ever again.”

“I suppose,” she said dubiously, and then she sighed. “You sound just like Glory. She’s always telling me that I don’t understand.”

“But you’re willing to learn,” he said, earnestly. “That counts for something.”

“That’s exactly what she said,” said Edith, laughing.

G7-84 returned her smile. “I told you she was the smart one. All my best ideas are hers, really.” His grin faded, his expression suddenly serious. “Glory’s safe,” he said cautiously. “You said so. Is G5-19 with her?”

“Who?”

He deflated slightly. “G5-19,” he said. “She and Glory were close, closer than any of us. That’s half the reason they wanted to escape, so they could be together and Glory could be herself without having to hide it.”

Edith recalled an entry on Desdemona’s terminal. “I don’t think she made it,” she said softly. “After they escaped, there was an accident--”

A door slammed shut behind his eyes, and he readopted the stiff posture common among the Institute synths. Edith was beginning to recognize it as defensive.

“I’m sorry,” she said, helplessly.

He smiled, a rictus grin entirely unlike the open, unguarded smiles he’d shared with her earlier. “Accidents happen,” he said, voice slipping back into flat tones. “It’s unavoidable.” He fixed her with a blank stare, grief and reproach in his dark eyes. “I can upload this routine onto our server. Was there anything else?”

She bit her lips. “I need information,” she said. “Courser patrols, the synths who want out, the researchers who might be sympathetic. Anything, everything.”

He nodded. “Of course. Can you read?”

She stared at him and he shrugged.

“Most people can’t, aboveground,” he said. “I can get the data you need. What else?”

Edith thought for a moment. “Yeah, there’s one thing,” she said, “do you have a name? I’m not good with numbers and designations, but I never forget a name.”

He startled again, and then smiled guardedly. “You’re the first human to ever ask,” he said. “My name is Raphael.”

“Raphael,” she repeated, nodding. “Thank you.”

“Happy to help,” said Raphael, smiling shyly. “Ma’am.”

\---

Raphael was as good as his word. Two days later, he returned her holotape with a wink and a meaningful glance at her Pip-Boy. She tucked it inside her Institute-issued jumper and slipped away, hiding in a bathroom stall and loading the tape onto her Pip-Boy.

It was a list: names, Courser patrols, routines, production data, even temperature readings from the concealed thermometers in the atrium. It was a veritable windfall of information, enough intel to satisfy Deacon _and_ Desdemona, enough raw data to occupy Tinker Tom for months. In gratitude, Edith gave Raphael one of her first-edition Grognak comics; he regarded the magazine like he’d never seen one before.

Her meeting with Patriot--Liam Binet--was brief and useless. He clutched her arm and spoke of slow change, stars in his eyes, and he directed her to speak to another synth: Z1-14.

There was a small network of rebel synths -- thirteen of them -- a tiny army slowly accumulating an arsenal of stolen mining equipment and repurposed gardening tools. Z1 was their ringleader; he had assumed Glory’s role at the helm of their fledgling resistance. It had been his idea for the synths to arm themselves.

“It will be dangerous,” he said blandly. “The researchers have never faced open resistance. Our first move against them must be decisive, because when they realize what we intend to do, they will respond in force.”

Edith nodded, her lucky stone clenched in her fist. It was 8PM, and the artificial sun in the atrium had dimmed, bathing the room in simulated twilight. The light was red and gold, but it lacked the brilliance and vitality of a true sunset. Gen-2 sentries prowled the perimeter of the grassy lawn, energy pistols and shock batons held slack in their steel fists.

“What about the other synths?” she said, speaking in a low voice. She sat by the edge of a decorative moat, her bare feet dangling in the cold water. Z1 stood behind her, diligently spreading fertilizer on the lawn. The water burbled merrily, cloaking their words in white noise.

“What about them?” he asked.

“When the fighting starts, will they join us?”

Z1 paused thoughtfully. “I cannot say,” he said. “It is likely that some will take up arms against the scientists. Some will defend against us. Many will run.” Another pause. “We were not programmed for violence. It does not come as easily to our kind as to yours.”

Edith pursed her lips. “Will they defend themselves if they’re attacked?”

“Yes,” he said, sounding vaguely affronted. “We are not helpless, merely pacifistic.”

Edith sighed. “I can leave the weapons tonight, but it’ll be another few weeks before we’re ready to move,” she said. “Is that enough time to recruit any more synths to our cause?”

“Perhaps,” said Z1. “We talk among ourselves, but it is impossible to be certain whether a prospect will be sympathetic to our cause.”

“We have the same issue,” she said, “up there. A lot of people are pretty hostile towards synths.”

“Why?” he asked, bland and unassuming.

“I--” she hesitated.

Why did anyone hate anyone? Why had it always been so easy for men’s anger and paranoia to overcome their better nature? It was humanity’s -- and now synthkind’s -- oldest question, and the most difficult to answer.

“You’re different than they are,” she said finally. “And they’re afraid.”

Z1 paused for reflection. “Fear deprives all men of reason.” He resumed his work, reaching into a canvas bag of nitrogen pellets and spreading them in an even layer over the grass.

She sighed again, suddenly exhausted. “I should go,” she said. “I shouldn’t be seen talking to you.”

“They are watching you,” he said quietly. “Father trusts you, but Dr. Ayo suspects. They are watching, and they are listening.”

“I know,” she said, and she hesitated. “Do you think he suspects you?”

A pause, longer than she would have liked. “There is no evidence,” he said slowly. “But they do not need evidence.”

“Z1--”

“In a few days, there will be an accident,” he said smoothly. “In the new tunnels. There will be an explosion and a cave-in, and a dozen troublesome synths will be buried under three tons of earth.”

“Convenient,” she said softly.

“There will be no bodies. The internal review board will suspect the SRB of arranging for our disposal instead of going through the proper channels and taking us in for reprogramming. Father will be furious at them for the waste of resources. There will be an inquiry.” She could hear the smile in his voice. “They will not suspect us.”

Edith nodded again, dark eyes fixed on her feet, slim and golden brown beneath the shimmering surface of the water. “Stay safe,” she whispered.

“You as well,” he said. “Ma’am.”

She counted to one hundred, then drew her knees up to her chest and clambered to her feet. She stood still for a moment, pretending to admire the synthetic landscape, and when she turned around, she was alone. Z1 was gone, no sign that he had been there at all. Edith crossed the lawn barefoot, shoes and socks dangling from her fingertips, grass clippings clinging to her feet and ankles. She passed through an archway, turned left, continued down a shadowed hallway, and ducked into a disused closet.

A moment to catch her breath, and she unbuttoned her coat and pulled out a slender package containing laser pistols and a small supply of energy cells. The package went into a locker, Edith rebuttoned her coat, and left. She took a meandering route back to her assigned quarters and went to bed early. When she returned to the closet the next morning, her package was gone. Someone had drawn a smiley face in the dust, a token thank-you from the underground.

:)

Grinning, she traced it with her fingertip, then wiped it away, concealing her involvement. She had an appointment with Father later that day: she’d passed her physical examination, and he was ready to give her an assignment on the surface. “You’re one of us now,” he said pompously, patting her hand and presuming her cooperation.

Edith grit her teeth and returned his smile. He’d assigned her to a retrieval detail with a Courser escort: find a rogue synth and bring him back. It was busywork, the sort of job she’d done for the Railroad before she’d graduated to more sensitive tasks. “This is vitally important,” he said, as though he were speaking to a child. “Retention is our top priority. B5-92 must be returned, unharmed.”

She nodded along, playing dumb and biding her time. She had already decided not to pursue the runaway, and as soon as she and X6-88 reached the surface, she turned to him. “There’s been a change of plans, X6,” she said, firmly. “We aren’t going to Libertalia.”

“Ma’am?” His expression was unreadable behind his mirrored shades. 

For a moment, she looked at X6 and saw Deacon, although their only shared trait was their ever-present sunglasses. Edith realized with a pang that she actually _missed_ the lying son-of-a-bitch. His absence was dull and heavy, like a ten pound weight in her gearbag, nothing at all like the sharp-edged grief that gripped her when she thought of Glory.

Edith sighed. “I have an errand to take care of, now and alone” she said, “head to Fort Independence, I’ll meet you there.” _Sorry Preston,_ she thought. _but if anyone can get through to the_ person _underneath the Courser, it’s you._

Alone, she tracked the shoreline north, toward HQ. She reached the Old North church at nightfall, easily bypassing Tom’s security measures. “Hey there!” she called out, announcing her presence with an ungodly clamor of steel-toed boots on stone stairs, “did you miss me?”

\---

As soon as they realized Edith had returned, Deacon and Desdemona pounced and drew her into a grueling three-hour debriefing. They turned Raphael's holo over to PAM for analysis and cross-examined Edith, wringing her brain like a sponge to extract all possible intel on the Institute.

When they were finished, Edith staggered into the showers and stuck her head under a cold-running tap, trying to wash away the brainfog brought on by an afternoon of questioning. She wrapped her wet hair in a towel and wandered back into the main room, damp, shivering, and relieved to be home after two weeks away.

The Railroad was home, now, its agents family. She recalled Deacon's words on her first night in HQ. _We’re just one big dysfunctional family. With guns!_ It might have been a joke, but it had become her truth.

She wandered over to the makeshift kitchen in search of something to eat. A week of grey nutrition paste had left her with a powerful craving for food, _real_ food. Ignoring Carrington's glower, she snatched a piece of frybread from the pan on the stove and stuffed it in her mouth, filling her pockets with bruised apples and hard cheese.

"So the food's still shit down there, huh?"

Mouth still full of bread, Edith spun around. Glory was leaning against a stone column, hands in her pockets. She looked _good_ , dark eyes rimmed with galena, her hair freshly bleached. Edith's heart leapt in her chest, and she felt like an eleven-year-old again, drunk off hormones and first love, absolutely wild about her pretty French teacher.

She swallowed. "Worst I've ever had."

"I don't even remember what it is," said Glory, "except that it's awful."

"It's not even food, just grey sludge," she said. "I'd rather eat dog food than live off that shit."

"Sounds about right," said Glory, fishing a cigarette from her pocket. "Wanna go for a walk?"

Edith glanced around. Carrington was bent over his workbench, blatantly eavesdropping, but everyone else was engaged in their own tasks. Deacon and Dez were arguing about Edith's report, Tom and Drummer were dozing on a grimy mattress, and PAM was in standby processing the data from Raphael's holotape.

"Yeah," she said. "I think I'd like that."

Unseen by anyone except the good doctor, they slipped out the back door and picked their way through the tunnels. They emerged by the harbor in the North End and turned south, walking along the water, on the lookout for raiders. Edith thought about Raphael and Z1 and G5; Glory hefted her minigun, boots scuffing on the uneven payment. Tiny plants grew up out of the cracked cement. Their footfalls crushed the pale green things, filling the air with their sweet springtime fragrance.

"You still mad at me?" asked Glory.

Edith sighed. "Life's too short."

"I'd be pissed, too, in your shoes." Glory shrugged. "I mean, shit. I like you. A lot, even. It's just not the right time."

"We've got more to worry about than matters of the heart, I get it." She thought of G5-19, about how much had gone unsaid between herself and Glory. The other woman didn’t know about Shaun or her first marriage or the husband decaying beneath the hill in Vault 111--

Glory snorted. "'Matters of the heart?' Have you been reading a lot of romance novels, Eddy?"

"Nah. Just spending too much time with Deacon."

"That'd do it," said Glory. She reached into her pockets for another cigarette, and turned up an empty pack, which she flicked into the harbor. It floated on the surface of the scummy black water, then sank beneath the choppy waves. They paused to watch it for a moment, then continued on their way.

"I met some people, while I was down there," she said carefully.

"Did you?"

"Yeah," said Edith. "Raphael."

Glory showed no sign of recognition.

"Raphael," she repeated. "G7-84--"

"Good god, Eddy," Glory interrupted. "He's my brother, I know damn well who he is." She turned to Edith, and there were tears standing in her dark eyes. "He's alright? He still remembers me?"

"He's fine. Worried about you, but fine."

Glory laughed, a tired little _ha_. "That's just like him," she said, smiling. "I'm a big girl. Raphael's still down there, he should worry about his own damn self."

"It won't be long," said Edith. "They're gathering weapons, they're recruiting more and more of the synths. It's only a matter of time before we're ready, and then they'll be free, all of them."

"I don't want to talk business," said Glory. "Enough of this glorious revolution horseshit. I just wanted to talk, yeah?"

"What about?"

Glory paused. "You still have my scarf," she said softly. "In your locker. I've seen it."

Lips pursed, Edith turned her head. "I don't want to talk feelings."

"No business, no feelings," said Glory. "What else is there?"

Edith looked at her, a smile tugging at the corner of her mouth. "The weather's been nice," she ventured. "Finally cooled off a bit."

Glory laughed, actually laughed, for the first time since Edith had returned from the Institute. It was a beautiful sound, rough and unmusical and exactly _right_. Unable to resist, Edith joined in, and their laughter echoed all along the wharf, bouncing off the walls of the empty buildings and softening the hold of the ghosts of their past loves.

\---

Edith returned to the Institute three days later. She timed her arrival to coincide with a meeting of the division heads, and she took great satisfaction in bursting through the doors, face contorted in a mask of fury.

"The Libertalia mission went belly-up," she said hotly. "Your intel was wrong. We were told to expect rifles and pistols, they had a fucking missile launcher--"

Father and all the white-coated researchers were on their feet in an instant, their hands thrown up in surrender. "Please, Mother, this isn't a good time," said Father, and she rounded on him, finger jabbing into his chest.

"--and that Courser of yours was no help at all!" she said, practically shouting. "I had to do _everything_ , alone!"

"--lower your voice, _please_ \--"

"--we might have stood a chance, if your intel hadn't been so far wrong--"

"-- _Mother!_ " said Father sharply. "Later, we can discuss this matter _later_."

She pretended to notice the division heads for the first time. Looking from face to face, she faltered. "Have I interrupted something?"

Father smiled, tight-lipped. "Nothing that can't be rescheduled," he said. "If you'll excuse us, Dr. Li, Dr. Ayo, Dr. Filmore--"

They filed out, each pausing to glare at Edith in turn. Leaning against one of the cool paneled walls, she played dumb, eyes wide and uncomprehending. To a man, the researchers treated her like an especially dim-witted child, let them think she was unstable as well as stupid. Anything to keep their attention focused on her, rather than the rebels.

When they were gone, she turned to father. "I'm sorry," she said, feigning contrition. "I didn't realize that you'd be in a meeting--"

He closed his eyes and breathed in sharply through his nose. Ten seconds passed, and he fixed her with a smile that didn't quite reach his eyes. "We know you didn't go to Libertalia," he said, his voice low. "We have Watchers onsite, and you never even arrived."

Edith said nothing, pressure building in her skull.

"In fact," he said. "As soon as you returned to the surface, you disappeared.”

She pressed her lips together and stared at him.

He sighed. “I know you have misgivings about us and the work we do. I know you collaborated with the Railroad--” Edith opened her mouth to deny his words, but Father silenced her with a gesture. “Please, allow me to finish.” He sat down and indicated that she should do the same.

Unease mounting she did as he asked, sliding into one of the uncomfortable, egg-shaped chairs. Father fixed his dark eyes on her and continued in a grave tone. “Whatever kindness the Railroad has shown you, they only ever intended to use you to strike at us. They are extremists, and they are dangerous. They care more about their misguided ideology than the fate of mankind.

“The world above has been devastated, not only by nuclear warfare, but by generations of neglect. We are the sole inheritors of Old World medical and agricultural knowledge. We are the only ones capable of purging the wasteland of radiation. And the Railroad would see us burn for it.” He sighed, as though the weight of the world rested solely on his narrow shoulders. “Synths aren’t human. They don’t think as we do, they don’t feel as we do. They were created for service, and they’re quite lost without our guidance. Just yesterday, a synth team working independently on an engineering product caused a cave-in that wiped out the entire team. They couldn’t manage without a human supervisor, and it’s _our_ fault for overestimating their capabilities.

 _Z1_ , she thought with a pang. _His plan worked!_ Edith swallowed, forced herself to respond to Father. “They look human,” she countered, blood pounding in her head. “They talk like humans, they act like humans.”

“Because we created them to do so,” he said. “I know it’s very difficult for you to understand _why_ we do the things we do, so I have to ask you to trust me. The Institute represents the only way forward for humanity. Together, you and I can restore the World-That-Was.” He took a deep breath. “All I ask of you is faith.”

“Shaun,” she said softly, “I’m from the World-That-Was. It wasn’t worth saving.”

“How can you say that?” he cried. “All the violence, the bloodshed, the poverty? Was is _that_ worth?”

She shrugged. “It’s not perfect,” she admitted, grimacing at the dull, pulsing headache swirling behind her temples. “But it’s worth _something_. There are good people up there, and they’re doing their damnedest not to repeat their ancestors’ mistakes. They’re moving forward.”

“Your Railroad cronies?” he jeered. “You’d trade utopia for the love of scavengers and terrorists?”

“Your ‘utopia’ means the death of every man, woman, and child living aboveground. It means the enslavement of a sentient race.” She shook her head. “No thanks. If you want to help, stop kidnapping, stop murdering, stop experimenting on civilians--”

“They have rejected every offer of help!” he said, practically shouting. He was red-faced with fury, veins and capillaries standing out in his forehead. “We made peaceful overtures, and they spat in our faces!”

“What overtures?” she shot back. “Offering someone a position in your feudal hierarchy isn’t a ‘peaceful overture--’”

“You understand _nothing_ ,” he spat. “I had such high hopes for you, I _believed_ in you, but you’re as ignorant as the rest of them. We could have done so much together, instead you’ll just wallow in the filth with the rest of the pigs.”

It was absurd. Edith laughed; she couldn’t help it. The pressure building in her head broke in a hailstorm of unrestrained laughter. Edith slumped over in her chair, clutching her sides, laughing so hard that she couldn’t draw breath. The room echoed with sound, snorts and gasps and peals of ungracious, unladylike laughter.

“Stop it,” said Father, petulant as a child. “It’s not funny!”

Edith laughed harder, and Father’s irritation turned to fear. He stared at her, wide-eyed, and reached under the table. He must have pressed a concealed panic button, because moments later, the doors slid open, and a security team headed by a Courser burst through, weapons at the ready. They faltered at the sight of Edith laughing like a drain and Shaun recoiling in his seat like he’d caught sight of a mouse.

She continued to laugh as the Courser hauled her out of her seat and dragged her across the room, toward the door. She laughed as they hustled her down gleaming white hallways, researchers appearing in doorways to investigate the source of the god-awful racket. She laughed when they threw her down onto the teleporter pad and entered a set of coordinates into the console.

She did not stop until a moment later, when the roar of the molecular relay had died down and she found herself in the ruins of the Commonwealth Institute of Technology, alone underneath an unrelenting blue sky. Her laughter died on her lips, and she stared out across the river at the silent skyline. When she pulled up her Pip-Boy and searched for radio signals, she couldn’t find the frequency for the Institute’s classical station.

Her mouth went dry. She had made a grave miscalculation.

\---

Her second homecoming was less impressive than her first. She slunk in after dark, sunburnt and dehydrated and consumed by immense guilt. Edith had blown her cover and sabotaged the Railroad’s best chance to bring them down. Z1 and his rebels were still in place, but without fire support from the Railroad, their odds of success were marginal.

When she returned to HQ, everyone was gathered around the central table, talking shop and eating a late supper. They were surprised to see her, confusion transmuted to fury when they realized what she’d done.

“They knew,” she said, her voice small. “I never had a chance.”

“You were supposed to keep a low profile,” said Carrington. “How hard is it to play along and maintain cover?”

“It’s not her fault,” interrupted Deacon. “She doesn’t have the training we all got--”

“And whose fault is that?” The doctor rounded on Deacon, his face contorted with fury. “You _insisted_ we bring her in. Didn’t I say this would end disastrously? Didn’t I say we were making a grave mistake?”

“Shut up!” Tom interrupted, angry as Edith had ever seen him. “You don’t need to rub it in--”

“She _said_ she wasn’t ready,” said Deacon. “Blame me for insisting she was.”

Desdemona stuck two fingers in her mouth and whistled, shrill and ear-splittingly loud. The conversation died immediately, and Desdemona pounced on the silence. “Enough,” she said, “this discussion isn’t productive. What’s done is done. We need to decide how to move forward, not waste our time and energy assigning blame.” She patted her breast pocket and pulled out a battered pack of cigarettes. Grounded and reassured by the familiar ritual, she withdrew a single cigarette and stuck it between her teeth without lighting it. “The holotape Edith brought back included sixty years of blueprints. There may be another way into the Institute.”

“We’ve been searching for _years_ ,” said Carrington. “If there was another entrance, someone would have found it by now.”

“Maybe, maybe not. Either way, it’s another avenue for investigation.”

Glory was the only person who hadn’t spoken. She hung back with her shoulders slumped and her arms folded over her chest; her expression shadowed and unreadable. Shamefaced and afraid, Edith watched the other woman through her lashes. She still cared about Glory, still cared about what the other woman thought of her. Stupid and selfish and irrational as it was, Glory’s opinion mattered as much to Edith as the looming threat of annihilation.

All at once, the exhaustion and emotion of the day caught up with her and sapped the last of her willpower. Her eyes pricked with tears, and she swallowed a sudden lump in her throat. _Don’t cry_ , she thought furiously, scrubbing at her eyes with the heel of her hands, _don’t you dare cry in front of everyone!_

Across the table, Desdemona’s eyes locked on Edith. She took in Edith’s red eyes and trembling lip, and her expression softened. “Let’s break for now,” she said to the group at large. “We can table this discussion until tomorrow.”

Edith flashed her a grateful, watery smile and fled toward the back door. She jumped the steps and waded into the fetid canal. The shock of the cold water gave her something to focus on besides her misery, and she crouched down, wallowing in the sensation of the slick stones underfoot and the stench in her nostrils. It was absolutely unbearable; it was a welcome reprieve from her thoughts.

“Hey!”

The door banged behind her and she turned to see Glory running toward her, heedless of the muck and the wet. She hauled Edith to her feet, her face alight with concern. “Are you alright?”

Edith threw herself against the other woman and burst into tears.

Startled, Glory pulled her closer. “Hey now,” she said. “You’re alright. It’s alright.” She wrapped her arms around Edith. The motions of rendering comfort were plainly unfamiliar to her; her words were stilted and her movements clumsy. Nevertheless, she held Edith upright, stroking her hair and patting her back until the sobs stopped. “It’s okay,” she said. “Nobody died. It’s okay.”

“We were so close,” said Edith, hiccuping. “So close! And I fucked it all up.”

“Any of us would have fucked it up,” said Glory. “It was impossible _not_ to fuck up.”

“I’m so sorry.”

For a moment, Glory said nothing. “You did your best,” she said. “You found Patriot. You got into contact with the Synth underground. And you heard Dez, there’s probably another way in. You fucked up, but not so bad we can’t unfuck it.”

Edith laughed, and it turned into a cough. Her face was a mess of snot and tears, and she sniffled, wiping at her nose with the back of her wrist. “Next time,” she said, “we go together. All of us. As a team. This clandestine shit isn’t working. It’s time for a show of force.”

“Spoken like a true heavy,” said Glory, snorting in laughter. “I’ll be sure to tell Dez you said so.”

“Don’t make it sound like my idea,” said Edith. “‘Cause Carrington would just shoot it down.”

“We gotta find a way to make it sound like Deacon’s idea.” Glory rubbed Edith’s back, small, soothing circles between her shoulderblades. “He’s got a _huuuuuge_ crush on him.”

“He does not!”

“Does so! ‘Cept he’s too socially inept to go ‘hey let’s fuck,’ so he just acts like Deeks is an idiot all the time and hopes he gets the idea.”

“Deeks _is_ an idiot,” said Edith. “And aren’t there rules about fucking?”

“What? No,” said Glory, blinking in confusion. She stared at Edith for a moment, and then started laughing. “Oh my god, did Deacon say there were? That fucking asshole! He’s just pissed off because he’s not getting any.”

Edith couldn’t help herself. She laughed, quickly stifling the sound with a fist over her mouth. Glory nudged her with an elbow. “Come on,” she said. “Your eyes aren’t red any more. Let’s head back in.”

“Thank God I’m not wearing mascara,” said Edith, forcing a smile. “Can you imagine?”

Glory tsk’d. “I wouldn’t let you go in with running makeup,” she said. “Come on, give me a _little_ credit.”

“What would you have done, run in for your makeup bag and a pot of cold cream?”

“Of course,” she said. “I would have given you a makeover. It would have been fun!”

“For _you_ , maybe,” said Edith. “You wear purple eyeshadow up to your eyebrows. No thanks.”

Glory cuffed her playfully. “You got a problem with my makeup, Eddy?”

“Only with your lipstick,” teased Edith. “It smears.”

Glory’s smiled and Edith’s knees went weak. Even in the gloom and muck, Glory was incredibly beautiful. Dark eyes, bright smile, warm hands. “Tease,” she said. “Come on, let’s get into some dry clothes.” She took Edith’s hand and tugged her out of the water and toward the door. They walked into HQ with their hands clasped, daring anyone to comment. They attracted a few double-takes, but no one said anything. Even Deacon held his tongue, although he shot them an indecipherable look.

They ate together, sitting hip-to-hip on a narrow bench, bumping elbows and forearms. Edith had missed this sort of quiet intimacy, the simple act of sitting together to share a meal. It was enough just to _be_ with her, to sit beside her and bask in her presence. Drunk off Glory’s proximity, Edith set her food aside and laid her head on the other woman’s shoulder, all her anxieties temporarily abated.

\---

They slept together in the most literal sense: two bodies pressed onto one narrow mattress, Edith’s back to Glory’s chest, Glory’s arm slung over her waist. Edith fell asleep with Glory’s breath on her cheek, the other woman’s body reassuringly warm and solid behind her. It was the most restful night of slumber she’d had in months, and it ended prematurely when Drummer Boy shook her awake, his pale face pinched with terror.

“Wake up! We’ve got trouble!”

“What?” Waking was like walking against a strong current; Edith couldn’t make sense of his words. “What’s going on?” Glory stirred behind her, yawning broadly and propping herself up on her elbow.

“We’ve got Brotherhood incoming,” said Drummer Boy, nervously wringing his hands. “Deacon went up to the steeple to smoke and saw three Vertibirds incoming. We’re about to get hit, _hard_.”

“What?” Edith scrambled upright, her bleariness driven back by spikes of panic. “How did they find us?”

“The classical station went off-air,” said Drummer. “Now they’re just broadcasting our coordinates on loop.”

“How the fuck--” said Glory.

Cold certainty struck Edith like a .308. “The Institute,” she said hoarsely. “ _Father._ ”

Glory swore, scrambling upright, reaching for her armored coat. “How long?” she demanded. “How long do we have to prepare?”

“Minutes, maybe.”

“It’ll have to be enough,” she said grimly. “Eddy, come on! You cover the rear door, I’ll take the front passage. We can’t let them through!” A distant explosion rocked the Old North Church, shaking dust from the ceiling. A scream died on Edith’s tongue and she was on her feet in an instant, scrambling for arms and armor. She’d left most of her kit behind in the Institute, she could only hope that Raphael had found it before the security team--

Desdemona appeared at her elbow and pressed a railway rifle into her hands. “This is it,” she said with an air of grim finality.

“Can we run?” Edith shouted over the roaring in her ears.

“They’ve got both exits covered,” she said. “Make them earn it.”

Edith nodded, fitting the rifle against her shoulder. Glory rushed past, scooping up her minigun, and Edith caught her wrist. “I’m sorry,” she whispered.

“Ah hell.” Glory kissed her fleetingly. “Eddy, I’ve got to _go_ \--”

“I’m so sorry.” She was crying again, but she couldn’t help it. Glory kissed her again and pulled away. Utterly fearless, she turned and rushed toward the stairs, taking them two at a time. Edith watched her go, heart sinking down into her stomach.

Someone shouted “Get ready!” and someone else responded, “here they come!”

The back door burst inward in a shower of metal and sparks. The first of the Brotherhood appeared, huge and looming in their power armor. They swung their plasma rifle up and around and fired. Edith screamed and returned fire. Her gun kicked like a mule and belched superheated steam; she felt the flesh on her forearm blister and burn. It was an abstract pain, and it only fueled her rage and terror. She fired until the rifle clicked, then reloaded. She didn’t think, she didn’t feel, she _moved_ , she _acted_. It was what she’d always done best.

A week, a day, an hour, a minute later, it stopped. There were no more Brotherhood, no more knights and paladins. The burn on her arm was red and angry, her flesh blistered and scorched. The air was thick with the smell of ozone and blood and burnt flesh, and Edith felt vaguely ill. Nausea hit her like a tidal wave, and she stooped and vomited until she had nothing left to bring up but bile.

Trembling, she straightened up, wiping her mouth. “Is that it?” she said. “Did we win?”

They had, but only technically. The Brotherhood invaders lay dead and dying in pools of blood and gore, but for every two dead knights, there was one of their own. The dark-haired woman who’d made the coffee, the twitchy runner with the track marks up and down their arms. A redheaded man she’d never spoken to, a thin woman who’d always made room for her during meetings. Alive one moment, dead the next. Another wave of nausea nearly knocked Edith off her feet, but she choked it down and turned. “We made it,” she said, disbelieving. “We made it.”

Desdemona was bleeding freely from a gash on her forehead; Deacon and Carrington knelt over a man with a dislocated arm. Deacon leaned on his chest and Carrington pushed the arm back into position. The man _screamed_ and Edith clapped her hands over her ears, letting her weapon slip from her fingers. It clattered on the floor and Deacon looked up, his lips moving. “Go find Glory,” he ordered, and Edith went.

Heart in her throat, she climbed the stone steps, stumbling over her feet. Splintered and riddled with plasma burns and bullet holes, the door hung crookedly on one hinge. A blast from an energy weapon had melted and deformed one of the hinges, the metal dripped like candle wax onto the stone floor. She wrenched the door open and passed through, into the mezzanine where she had first encountered the Railroad.

“Glory?”

Half a dozen knights and paladins lay at the far end of the room, their armor riddled with fist-sized holes. The smell of blood was thick in the air, and Edith choked, tugging the neck of her undershirt up over her mouth and nose. She took a half-step toward the dead men at, and she slipped on loose bullet casings and fell to the ground. She flung her arms out to break her fall, skinning her palms on the stone and knocking the air from her lungs. She rolled from her belly to her back and found herself face-to-face with Glory.

The other woman lay still, her armor saturated with blood. Her face and hair were streaked with gore, and at Edith’s panicked shout, her eyes fluttered open. “Eddy,” she breathed, barely audible. “I did it. I fucking did it.”

“Oh my god, _Glory_!” Edith scrambled to her side, scattering casings with each clumsy movement. “Glory, don’t talk.” She pushed Glory’s hair back off her face, smearing blood across her forehead. Her skin was grey and cool to the touch, shining with sweat. Her minigun lay discarded at her side, a long gouge along the side of the barrels.”You’re alright,” she said, grabbing at Glory’s hands. “It’s going to be alright.”

Glory’s lips moved silently for a moment. Pink foam dribbled down from the corner of her mouth and she squeezed Edith’s hand weakly. “No Eddy,” she said, her voice barely audible, “I’m not going to make it.”

“Shut up,” said Edith fiercely. “Don’t say that.” She looked over her shoulder; no one had followed her up the stairs. “Hey!” she shouted, her voice echoing in the catacombs. “I need Carrington! Glory’s hurt real bad!”

Glory stared at her, doleful as a hound dog, then her eyelids drooped and she lay her head back against the wall. “You’re an idiot,” she said faintly.

“Glory, no!” Edith cried. She clutched the other woman’s shoulders, shaking her slightly. “Don’t you dare close your eyes!”

There were footfalls behind her, and she turned to see Carrington clutching his bag, his dark eyes wide with panic. He dropped to his knees at Glory’s side and scrambled to find a pulse. “She’s alive,” he said. “For now.”

“Carrington, _please_ ,” said Edith hoarsely. “You have to save her.”

The doctor said nothing and reached into his bag for a Stimpak. He injected the Stim directly into her neck, and she flinched as the needle went in, her face contorting in pain. Edith moved to soothe her, but Carrington shook his head. “Please Edith,” he said. “Let me work.”

Tears in her eyes, Edith sat back on her haunches. Glory’s brown skin had taken on a corpselike pallor, her face slack and expressionless. Carrington withdrew a rag and a bottle of peroxide from his bag and began cleaning the blood from her face and neck. He removed her coat and set it aside. Her undershirt clung to her skin, white cotton dyed red with blood. Her flesh was cratered with burns and lacerations, and oozing a bloodless white fluid. Revolted, Edith forced herself to look away.

“What do I do?” she said. “What can I do?”

“Find Desdemona,” he said firmly, dabbing at the blood on Glory’s chest. “She has a plan.”

“Escape?”

Blood streaked on his face and forearms, Carrington turned to her and smiled, all teeth. “Revenge.”

\---

It was called Operation Red Glare, and it was suicide. Infiltrate the Pyrdwen, plant explosives, and blow the Brotherhood of Steel out of the fucking sky. “Be honest,” said Edith, wetting her lips with her tongue. “Do we even have a chance?”

Grim-faced, Desdemona didn’t answer. Deacon shrugged theatrically. “Maybe,” he said. “But if we pull it off?”

“If we pull it off, we’re dead,” said Edith. “You just want to make us all martyrs for this.”

“What else can we do?” He threw his hands up. “The Institute _and_ the Brotherhood know where we are. It’s only a matter of time before they send a second wave to mop up after the first. We’ve got four dead, one dying--”

“Don’t you _dare_ \--” Edith interrupted, spitting venom. “Glory’s going to be _fine_.”

He fixed her with a pitying look. “We’re outgunned, outmanned, outnumbered. Our enemies --both of them -- have resources we can’t imagine. We’re all going to die, but we get to chose _how_.” He paused. “Not everyone gets that choice,” he said quietly.

“Nobody _has_ to die,” Edith said emphatically. “If we run--”

“There’s nowhere to run to,” said Desdemona tiredly. “Deacon’s right. I hate to admit it, but we’re out of options. This is going to be our last stand. We have to make it count.”

Deflated, Edith looked between them. Deacon and Desdemona, Tom and Drummer Boy -- Carrington was with the wounded, Glory remained in critical condition. So many weeks of planning, so many months of searching, and this was what it came down to: seven people in a dirty basement, exhausted and afraid, gripped by grief.

“Fuck it,” she said. “If this is it, then this is it. Let’s goddamn _go _.”__

__Their mission briefing lasted fifteen minutes. Deacon gathered the necessary supplies -- explosive packs, stolen Brotherhood flight suits, suppressed 10mm handguns for concealed carry -- while Tinker Tom reviewed the manual for Vertibird operation. Edith leaned against the wall and chewed her fingernails, eyes darting around HQ, memorizing every detail. She did not expect to return._ _

__The three of them set out together. Fueled by grief and rage, they walked without stopping, covering the three mile distance in less than an hour. Their assault was a knife in the back: quick, messy, utterly unexpected. Before she had a chance to pause for breath, Edith was in the back of a vertibird, stripping out of her armored coat and pulling a Brotherhood flight suit on. It was too small in the hips and across the chest, but it would do. She zipped it over her chest, gathered her hair into a messy bun, and prayed that no one would look twice at her._ _

__Deacon spent the ride with his head between his knees, praying loudly as the ‘Bird dipped and swayed, buffeted by the strong wind in off the harbor. Take-off was rough as Tom wrestled with the controls, but by the time they’d passed over the Charles River, he had it steady. Deacon recovered from his acrophobia long enough to bluff their way past air traffic control, and Tom managed to dock the Vertibird in the correct port with only a bump and a scrape._ _

__“I’ll keep it spooled,” he said as Edith and Deacon clambered down from the Vertibird. “As soon as you’ve placed the explosives, _run_.”_ _

__Edith nodded. “Good-bye, Tom,” she said. “I’m glad I met you.”_ _

__Swallowing some inexpressible emotion, he shook his head. “Good luck, you two,” he whispered. “Stay safe, okay?”_ _

__“You too,” said Deacon. “And Tom, if it gets dicey? Go. That’s a direct order.”_ _

__“Aw man, you know I can’t follow that,” Tom said sadly. “You two better go before anyone notices us standing here, talking.” Deacon nodded and turned to go. Spurred by a sudden wave of nostalgia, Edith reached for Tom’s hand and squeezed. He nodded, lip trembling, and Edith set off after Deacon. She fell into step beside him._ _

__“I don’t mind saying,” she muttered, out of the corner of her mouth. “I'm not exactly _excited_ about this arrangement."_ _

__He grinned, blue eyes flashing behind his sunglasses. "They warned me you were an asshole," he said smiling fondly. “Come on, Edith. Let’s do something _really_ fucking stupid.”_ _

__“After you.”_ _

__Together, they crossed the flight deck and ascended the stairs. They climbed up into the bridge and no one stopped them, even when they broke off the main path and climbed over a locked security gate, into a restricted area. The low roar of the massive engines disguised their echoing footfalls, and they broke into a run, hurrying toward the places indicated on Desdemona’s diagrams. “Come on,” Edith muttered, to herself and to Deacon. “It’s got to be around here somewhere.”_ _

__Running blind, no longer concerned for stealth or propriety, Edith rounded a corner and collided with a man in a Scribe’s uniform. Stumbling, his brow furrowed in confusion, the scribe opened his mouth to speak. Without hesitating, Edith drew her concealed weapon and fired point-blank, once, twice, three times. The roaring engines swallowed the Scribe’s pained shout and the ear-splitting crack of her 10mm._ _

__Mouth open in fear and alarm, the man stumbled backward into the railing and collapsed in an graceless heap. It was no less than Glory deserved._ _

__“Goddamn,” Deacon muttered. “We could have _tried_ to bluff him.”_ _

__“We’re getting close. Come on,” she said, cold and hard as iron._ _

__They climbed a ladder and found themselves in a deserted gantry surrounding the fuel cores. “Jackpot,” she murmured. Moving quickly, she divided the explosive packs evenly between herself and Deacon. They moved from core to core, nesting the explosives amid the tangled wires and humming cylinders._ _

__“Let’s get out of here before they find the body.”_ _

__Edith nodded and motioned for him to lead. Hand on her concealed 10mm, she followed him down a ladder, across a creaking catwalk, and down a flight of stairs to the bridge. The door to the flight deck was in sight when a man’s voice split the air like thunder._ _

__“Knight! Why are you out of uniform?”_ _

__Edith froze._ _

__“I am speaking to you, Knight! You _will_ stand at attention when I address you.” She turned and found herself face-to-face with Elder Maxson. He stood five feet nine inches, and wore a full beard and a frankly-impressive coat. He heavily scarred, built solid as an oak, but the face behind the beard was a boy’s. He couldn’t have been older than nineteen or twenty, despite his lofty title and the deferential scribes hovering at his elbow, clutching clipboards._ _

__He frowned at her, eyes narrowing. “I don’t recognize you,” he said slowly. “Who’s your commanding officer, Knight?”_ _

__“Er,” she said, unconvincingly._ _

__That was when all hell broke lose. Deacon had escaped the Elder’s notice and disappeared into the shadows. He drew his weapon and fired. The bullet entered Maxson’s skull in his right temple, and it exited just above his right ear. For a moment, he stood perfectly still, wide-eyed with pain and terror, then he collapsed, tipping forward like a felled tree. The screaming began all at once._ _

__The attending scribes dropped their clipboards and whirled around, searching the shadows for the assassin. Edith’s first shot caught the taller Scribe in the calf; he collapsed with a strangled cry. Her second shot went wide, punching a hole in the flimsy metal panelling. She reloaded and fired, and the other scribe slumped over, blood dribbling from their mouth. Footsteps echoed throughout the bridge as Knights and Scribes alike responded to the gunfire._ _

__“Edith, we have to go!”_ _

__“Hold on!” she shouted. She bent over Maxson’s cooling body and turned him onto his belly. No easy task, the man was 200 pounds of pure muscle. She yanked on his coat, struggling to work his arms free of the sleeves._ _

__“What the fuck are you doing?” said Deacon, tugging at her arm. “We are literally about to fucking die!”_ _

__She jerked her arm out of his hold and fixed him with a glare. “I said _hold on_ ,” she snapped. With a final, triumphant tug, she managed to free one of the Elder’s thick arms. The other one came easily, and she pulled the coat free of his limp body, then stood and turned to face Deacon. “Ready!”_ _

__“Oh my god,” he said. “Come the fuck on!”_ _

__He grabbed her forearm and ran, pulling her along in his wake. They burst through the door to the flight deck just as the first of the Knights arrived to investigate. Their hoarse cries spurred Edith and Deacon onward as they ran, pell-mell, toward the waiting Vertibird. Tom provided cover fire with his own 10mm. Dodging bullets and curses, Edith tossed her trophy into the ‘Bird and vaulted up after it, stopping to offer Deacon a hand. She hauled him up beside her as Tom plopped down in the pilot’s seat and grabbed the throttle, pulling _up_ and _away_ with a sickening lurch. Edith stumbled, sliding sideways toward the open door, but Deacon flung an arm around her waist just in time. He clutched at her as Tom flew away from the Prydwen, his fingers biting into her forearm._ _

__She fumbled for the detonator, thumb hovering over the red button. “Do you want to do the honors?” she said, “or should I?”_ _

__“Sweet Christ,” Deacon mumbled, very pale beneath his sunglasses. “Just push the fucking button.”_ _

__She did, and the Prydwen exploded like a firework: red fire burst outward as the charges burst and the gases caught fire. The balloon popped like a paper bag, consumed by a massive fireball. The resultant shock wave buffeted their small aircraft, causing it to sway drunkenly midair. Deacon groaned and buried his face in Edith’s chest, clinging to her like an infant holding its mother. She patted his back idly. “We did it, Deeks,” she said, shaking him slightly. “We fucking did it, can you believe it?”_ _

__The Prydwen’s metal skeleton split in midair, and its separate parts crashed to the ground, kicking up a massive dust cloud far below. Tom pulled on the yoke and the Vertibird climbed, careening dangerously as they fled. Edith could hardly hear the rotors over the blood pounding in her ears, could hardly feel the cold metal at her back. “We did it,” she breathed. “We fucking did it.”_ _

____

\---

Fifteen minutes later, Tom set the Vertibird down in a marshy field. “That’s as far as she’ll go,” he said, patting the ‘Bird’s metal hide. “Unless you can think of somewhere to fuel up, we’re walking the rest of the way.” Nervous as a jackrabbit, he looked around, regarding the open field with an expression of abject horror.

Edith looked up at the darkening sky anxiously. “It’s what, five or six miles from here?” she said, fingering the scarf around her neck. “Can we make that before nightfall?”

“I doubt it,” said Deacon. “But when has that ever stopped you before?”

“I’m not usually travelling overground with--” she gestured at Tom, who stared up at the open sky like it might fall on his head “--other people.”

“He’ll be just fine,” he said, clapping the other man on the back. “Won’t you, Tom?”

Startled, Tom jumped backwards, his eyes showing white like a spooked horse. “I’m fine,” he said, his voice strained. “But uh, can we get into cover? I’m feeling pretty...exposed.”

“See?” said Deacon brightly. “Just fine!”

Edith sighed. “Let’s hurry,” she said. “Please. For the sake of my nerves.”

Their first walk had been far easier. Fueled by adrenaline and rage, the distance had been inconsequential. With their greatest victory behind them and nothing to look forward to, gravity weighed more heavily on their limbs as they gathered up their packs. Exhausted and stumbling like drunks, their motley crew picked their way through the long grass, heading towards the broken asphalt road that would lead them south, toward Boston.

The road took them through the heart of raider territory, and Edith was too tired to argue when Deacon produced a trio of Stealth Boys from a hidden pocket. They were Tinker Tom’s variation on the classic formula: turbo-charged with salvaged fusion cores, their stealth field extended twice as far and lasted twice as long as a standard Stealth Boy. They activated the devices and joined hands to avoid losing one another, then walked south, scarcely daring to breathe as they skirted raider encampments.

Dusk had fallen by the time they reached the outskirts of downtown. The Old North Church was barely visible on the horizon, its steeple jutting up above the surrounding buildings. There was a single lantern lit in the peak, its light visible for miles around. A beacon for synths and their allies, a middle finger raised against the world.

To the east, the Prydwen still burned: a smear of black smoke on the horizon. For a moment the sight of it transfixed her. She stood quite still in the middle of the road. The Stealth Boy on her hip sputtered and discharged a last wave of energy. The stealth field dissipated as the battery died, and she flickered back into being, a specter on the empty streets of Boston, held captive by distant smoke.

It was enough to make her forget her fear about returning home. None of them were certain what they would find when they returned. They had been gone for most of a day, the Brotherhood might have returned with a second strike team, the Institute might have grown impatient and sent Coursers. Even if the Railroad had endured, Glory might still be unconscious, might still be hemorrhaging, might be dead.

Edith shivered and shook herself free of her trance. “Come on,” she muttered. “It’s not far now.”

After the excitement of the day, their homecoming was an anticlimax. Edith’s heart began to beat rapidly in her throat as they crossed the long bridge over the Charles. The closer they were to headquarters, the faster her heart beat, until she was _certain_ that she was going to have a heart-attack. Numb with terror, she groped at Deacon and Tom, mutely seeking support. Tom took her hand and squeezed gently, fixing her with a tired smile. He looked as exhausted as she felt.

Deacon looked exactly the same. His calm demeanor betrayed no fear as he lead them through the stinking tunnels, toward HQ. As they drew closer, they heard the clink of bottles, the soft murmur of hushed voices engaged in clandestine conversation. Deacon pushed the door open, and a hush fell over the room. Everyone looked up all at once: Desdemona and a runner at the main table, Drummer Boy at Tom’s workbench. There was a collective intake of breath, a shared sigh of relief at their return.

“We’re safe for now,” said Desdemona. “With the Brotherhood gone and our base routed, PAM says the Institute will just watch and wait and see what crawls up out of the wreckage.”

“That sounds just like them,” Edith muttered, looking past Desdemona. Only two people had failed to take notice of her arrival. Carrington stood off to the site, arguing with a recalcitrant patient over the placement of an IV line. Peevish and exhausted, he brandished his syringe like a harpoon, threatening to sedate her if she _insisted_ on being difficult--

 _Glory_.

Alive, upright, heavily bandaged, still a little pale underneath her bruises. But _alive_ , tubes in her arm and nose. She was hooked up to a ventilator and an IV line, but sitting upright in the cleanest bed the Railroad had to offer.

Edith stopped short and stared, mouth falling open. _She’s alive_ , she thought, scarcely believing her eyes. _Alive!_

Glory looked up at the same moment, eyes widening when they landed on Edith.

“Eddy!” she cried, hoarsely, ignoring Carrington’s protests as she moved to climb out of bed.

Tears standing in her eyes, Edith rushed to her side. “Oh my god,” she said, sobbing with relief. “I thought you died!”

Glory was crying too, fat tears rolling down her cheeks, smearing her mascara. “When I woke up and they said you were gone--” she lapsed into choked silence, shaking her head furiously. Carrington made a noise of protest, but Glory waved him away as if he were of no more consequence than a gnat, buzzing around their ears. “--I was _pissed_ \--”

Edith took up her hand and kissed each of her fingers. “We had to do it,” she said. They were both eager to speak, stumbling over their words and interrupting one another in their haste. “They would have kept coming and coming and--”

“--you went without me!”

Laughing through the tears, Edith leaned in to kiss her, not caring that the entire Railroad was watching, not caring that they had both almost died that day, not caring about anything at all except the woman in the bed in front of her. She had almost lost her, and she’d never let go again.

“I got you a present,” she said shyly, leaning back.

“Oh?” Glory smiled up at her, eyes shining.

“Yeah.” Edith dropped her bag at her feet and stooped to undo the clasps. She reached inside and pulled out the coat she’d taken from Maxson. It was lightweight and lined with ballistic fiber, finer work than even Tom could have done in his workshop. Glory’s eyes lit up at the sight of it, and she reached out for it wonderingly.

“Where did you get this?” she asked, running her fingers over the supple leather. “It’s amazing!”

“Got it off someone who didn’t look _nearly_ as good in it as you’re going to,” said Edith.

“Holy shit,” Glory breathed. “If I didn’t have all these fucking tubes in me, I’d put it on right now--”

“If you would just _cooperate_ with me,” said Carrington testily, “you’d have a moment to bathe and change clothing.”

Edith startled; she had forgotten the doctor was there. Glory fixed him with a withering look. “Why didn’t you say so?”

He threw his hands up. “I did! Repeatedly! For the past ten minutes--”

“Carrington,” said Edith fondly, “shut up.”

He was so offended by this that Desdemona had to take him aside and Deacon had to step in to assist Glory in undressing. She was still very weak, unable to do more than sit up and lift her arms when prompted. Edith stumbled over her own feet in her eagerness to help out, and between the three of them, they managed to place a new line and get Glory into the magnificent coat.

It looked much better on her than on Elder Maxson. Edith said so, and Deacon agreed. He then excused himself, rejoining the larger group to debrief with Desdemona, leaving Edith and Glory in relative privacy in the quietest corner of headquarters. Edith hesitated for a moment, standing by Glory’s bedside, too overwhelmed for eye contact.

“You’re alright,” she said softly. “You’re really alright.”

Glory took her hand, soft and gentle. “I am,” she said. “You saved me. And you blew up the _entire_ Brotherhood of Steel,” she said, wonder in her voice. “I can’t believe it. Do you have any idea _how_ many synth lives we lost to those assholes? You’ve saved more synths today than the entire Railroad has, probably _ever_ \--”

“It wasn’t just me,” said Edith. “If Deacon and Tom hadn’t been there, I would have been dead twice over.”

“Fuck them,” said Glory plainly. “I don’t care what they did, I care about you. And as far as I’m concerned, you singlehandedly hijacked that ‘Bird, rigged those charges, murdered the Elder, and blew all the rest of those motherfuckers straight to hell.”

Edith smiled at her. “I had a busy day.”

“Yeah, and you must be fucking exhausted.” Glory shimmied over to make room in the bed, then patted the mattress beside her. “Come on, lay down with me.”

She glanced over her shoulder. “I don’t know how Dr. C would feel about that.”

Glory rolled her eyes. “I’m all out of fucks to give about Carrington’s feelings.” She looked up at Edith through her lashes, smiling crookedly. “But maybe you could give me some more--”

“Here? In front of everyone?”

She laughed. “No, you goon! Come on, I’m trying to talk you into bed. It wasn’t this hard the last time, what gives.”

“I was pretty drunk,” said Edith, smiling. “You were, too, as I recall.”

“Whatever! I’m not drunk now, and I want you to lay down next to me so I can stop talking and get some rest, dammit. I need to convalesce, and then we’re bringing the fight to the Institute,” she said fiercely. “I’ve got to save my family and liberate the synths and--”

“Am I keeping you up?” Edith teased. “Should I let the invalid rest?”

Laughing, Glory grabbed her forearm. In a surprising display of strength, she hauled Edith down beside her, wrapping her arms around her and squeezing. “Goodnight,” she said, holding Edith in place. “Goodnight!”

Edith wriggled out of her grasp. “It’s not even eight yet,” she complained, but the soft, warm bed was starting to have an effect on her. Unconsciously, she burrowed into Glory’s side, burying her face in her hair and settling in the warm, sheltered divot made by the other woman’s body. Safe and secure among friends, no burden of guilt weighing on her mind, Edith drifted into a deep, untroubled sleep.

When Carrington returned to their bedside a few minutes later, he found both women sound asleep, tangled in one another’s arms.

**Author's Note:**

> The sole survivor initially holds dehumanizing beliefs about synths, but realizes that she was wrong. Objectifying, dehumanizing language is used about synths by the sole survivor and by characters in the Institute. Two characters consume alcohol and have (consensual) sex. A trans woman of color is seriously injured off-screen, but recovers from her injuries. No named characters die. Graphic, canon-typical violence throughout.


End file.
